Cleveland Browns eye domed stadium move

Image: Cleveland Browns

The National Football League’s (NFL) Cleveland Browns are planning a move away from their current city home to a new domed stadium in Brook Park, Ohio.

The Cleveland Browns plan to leave their current open-air Huntington Bank Field stadium in the city of Cleveland for the yet-to-be-built domed stadium.

The lease for the Browns’ current stadium expires after the 2028 NFL season, so the plan is to kick off the 2029 season at the Brook Park dome, a spokesperson for the Cleveland Browns said.

The Cleveland Browns are a professional American football team based in Cleveland (US). Named after original coach and Co-Founder Paul Brown, they compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the American Football Conference North division.

Image: Cleveland Browns

The 67,895-capacity Huntington Bank Field is a multipurpose stadium in Cleveland, Ohio, United States, meant primarily for American football. It is the home field of the Cleveland Browns of the National Football League (NFL) and serves as a venue for other events such as college and high school football, soccer and concerts.

However, the harsh weather limits the number of events that can be held at the stadium on an annual basis.

The City of Cleveland and Haslam Sports Group have been negotiating about renovating the existing stadium or potentially building a new one in Cleveland.

But the Haslam Sports Group had also been considering a $2.4 billion dome in Brook Park and intends to go with that option.

Image: Cleveland Browns

Cleveland Mayor Justin Bibb said he had been told by the Browns owners Jimmy and Dee Haslam of their plan to move.

Bibb expressed his disappointment in a press release. He said, “They had the opportunity to reinvest in Cleveland, transform the current stadium into a world-class facility, enhance the fan experience, and remain highly profitable. We put those options on the table in good faith. Unfortunately, that was not enough.”

He said their decisions was “driven by a desire to maximize profits rather than positive impact.”

The Browns’ departure is estimated to cost the city of Cleveland $30 million per year in economic impact, according to the mayor’s release. The city is still open to resuming negotiations if the Brook Park venue does not work out, Bibb said.

For their part, the Haslams said in a statement, “We pursued many possibilities, with our initial focus on renovating the current stadium and engaged design, construction and engineering experts to develop a plan to do so.

“We also explored building a new stadium on multiple sites, both within and outside of Cleveland. We’ve learned through our exhaustive work that renovating our current stadium will simply not solve many operational issues and would be a short-term approach.

Image: Cleveland Browns

“With more time to reflect, we have also realized that without a dome, we will not attract the type of large-scale events and year-round activity to justify the magnitude of this public-private partnership. The transformational economic opportunities created by a dome far outweigh what a renovated stadium could produce with around 10 events per year.”

They said that moving the current stadium will allow the city and region’s collective vision for the Cleveland lakefront to be optimally realized, and downtown will benefit from the major events the Brook Park dome, which would be 16 miles from the current stadium, brings to the region.

The Brook Park dome will not use existing taxpayer dollars, the release said.

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