Dive Brief:
- The joint venture of Mortenson Construction and McCarthy Building Cos. is 15% done with construction on the $1.8 billion Las Vegas stadium that will be home to the NFL's Oakland Raiders when the franchise makes the transition to its new home city in time for the 2020 NFL season, according to the Las Vegas Review-Journal.
- Team officials said that work so far, which included excavating approximately 1 million cubic yards of dirt, hasn't yielded any "surprises" that could negatively impact the already-tight 30-month completion schedule. Currently, hundreds of workers are constructing the concrete wall forms and columns for upper levels of the stadium, and by the end of July, crews are scheduled to start vertical construction with prefabricated steel. Onsite already are cranes that will eventually lift the stadium's plastic polymer roof in place. There could be small fluctuations in material prices because of President Donald Trump's steel and aluminum tariffs, but Don Webb, the chief operating officer of Raiders subsidiary StadCo, said those changes would be minimal because stadium materials were ordered before the tariffs went into effect.
- The Raiders have not released details on season ticket sales, more specifically the associated personal seat license charges that will help finance its portion of the project. Seat licenses are expected to be thousands of dollars for premium seats. Thousands of fans have reportedly put down $100 deposits for tickets, and the team would not comment on rumors that premium seating, including club seats and luxury boxes, are almost sold out.
Dive Insight:
One of the reasons construction has been moving along without any major hiccups so far can likely be chalked up to the construction team's depth of experience working on major sports venues. Mortenson delivered the Minnesota Vikings' $1.1 billion U.S. Bank Stadium one month ahead of schedule in June 2016, and is a recognized expert in the sports venue construction arena. In March, Mortenson and McCarthy negotiated a $1.8 billion guaranteed maximum price contract for the stadium, which included $1.4 billion for construction costs.
Despite enthusiasm for the project, there are still naysayers who object to the state's authorization of a $750 million contribution to stadium construction through an increase in Clark County's hotel tax. One outspoken critic of the deal is Dan Schwartz, state treasurer and gubernatorial candidate. Schwartz said that if he is elected governor in November, he would pull support for the $900 million of infrastructure work that the Nevada Department of Transportation is planning to execute around the stadium unless the team agrees to redirect hotel-tax money to teachers' salaries and education savings accounts.
