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Lawrence Joel Veterans Memorial Renovations

We're stuck with the war memorial so have to make the best of it.

This has a bit too much rah rah go team 'murica for my tastes (bronze soldiers guarding each entrance? Really?) but that seems to be the way things get built these days. I think a memorial should be more about reflecting on the price of war. The statue honoring Mr Joel himself is good.
 
Deacon923 said:
We're stuck with the war memorial so have to make the best of it.

This has a bit too much rah rah go team 'murica for my tastes (bronze soldiers guarding each entrance? Really?) but that seems to be the way things get built these days. I think a memorial should be more about reflecting on the price of war. The statue honoring Mr Joel himself is good.
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Agreed. A memorial about the price of war seems to reflect the heroics of a medic better than jingoism.
 
PhDeac said:
Agreed. A memorial about the price of war seems to reflect the heroics of a medic better than jingoism.
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That would be more fitting. In theory Medics are "non-combatants." If you understand the citation for Lawrence Joel's Medal of Honor, you would know he was honored with it because he was doing his duty to help wounded fellow soldiers, at great risk to his own life. It is extremely rare for the Medal of Honor to be awarded for efforts that only involve saving lives and not killing enemy combatants.
 
Hopefully they will check out the Air Force Academy's plaza of Heroes on how to do it right. As opposed to calling it Lawrence’s Lounge. The entry is a bit creepy looking.
 
I read the whole thread anxiously waiting to fight with someone arguing this debacle is good for our basketball team. I was disappointed that I didn’t get that chance.

The first question when targeting real estate is “who is my competitor for this property and what are they offering?” With the Joel, the answer was $1.
 
With all the money going into this money pit for a dying program, it’s harder and harder to argue that we shouldn’t have built a new stadium.
 
Maybe Joel Osteen would want it for his east coast pulpit. We know he likes to take over basketball arenas, and it's got half his name on it already.
 
PhDeac said:
With all the money going into this money pit for a dying program, it’s harder and harder to argue that we shouldn’t have built a new stadium.
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Except that it only cost us $7 million for the Coliseum including all the parking area around it.
 
Was the expensive renovation cancelled?
 
PhDeac said:
Was the expensive renovation cancelled?
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Somebody may know more about this than I do, but I go to the home games so I've seen what they've done that's visible. The only visible renovations are that they painted "Wake Forest Demon Deacons" everywhere that they could, installed a (much needed) new scoreboard over the court, large monitors in each corner upstairs that show the score and game/player stats, and a new 360 degree advertising band on the facing of the balcony (presumably paid for by the advertising). There was some deferred maintenance to take care of like roof leaks, and there may have been some back of the house work that the public doesn't see (maybe on the locker rooms?), but there's been nothing that anyone would call even moderately major renovations. Seats are the same, bathrooms are the same, concourse is the same, and the Windsor Jewelry Room is still the same. The biggest change may be that we can now buy beer.

I don't want to re-ignite the old debate about this, but a good point of comparison is Gonzaga which built their 6,000 seat arena in 2004. If Wiki is correct, it cost them $25 million then, or the equivalent of $33.2 million today. $7 million for the 14,500 seat Joel was a steal, even with a few million bucks spent on some new lipstick. The land value alone is several million. And if we ever do want to build something smaller on campus, where would you put parking even for a 6,000 seat arena? There's not enough parking for just the students, faculty, and staff, some of whom have to park at the God Dome and even in the Groves Stadium parking lot and take a shuttle bus to campus. Most students have cars today (unlike back in our day).

Another example is the U of Miami's arena: 8,000 seats; built in 2003 for $48 million or $60.8 million in 2018 dollars. Again, the Joel deal was a steal for WFU.
 
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With all the money Wake saved buying this shithole you think there would be enough money to buy out the shitty basketball coach.
 
Last I heard there was a ton of back of the house work needed that may require playing in Greensboro for a season.
 
While thinking about changes in the Joel, I remembered that WF got a new floor last season and after looking up some info, it was most likely needed/required since floors are supposed to last somewhere between 10 to 20 years assuming something like 40-50 games and numerous tear-downs/builds, etc. The NBA even has a rule requiring new floors every 10 years (do not know if the NCAA/ACC has similar guidelines).
 
Burn it down and collect the insurance check. Cancel next season, because who gives a shit anyway. Come back in 20-21 with a new coach and new arena!
 
Deaconblue said:
That would be more fitting. In theory Medics are "non-combatants." If you understand the citation for Lawrence Joel's Medal of Honor, you would know he was honored with it because he was doing his duty to help wounded fellow soldiers, at great risk to his own life. It is extremely rare for the Medal of Honor to be awarded for efforts that only involve saving lives and not killing enemy combatants.
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I don't believe that's correct.
 
dinws said:
Somebody may know more about this than I do, but I go to the home games so I've seen what they've done that's visible. The only visible renovations are that they painted "Wake Forest Demon Deacons" everywhere that they could, installed a (much needed) new scoreboard over the court, large monitors in each corner upstairs that show the score and game/player stats, and a new 360 degree advertising band on the facing of the balcony (presumably paid for by the advertising). There was some deferred maintenance to take care of like roof leaks, and there may have been some back of the house work that the public doesn't see (maybe on the locker rooms?), but there's been nothing that anyone would call even moderately major renovations. Seats are the same, bathrooms are the same, concourse is the same, and the Windsor Jewelry Room is still the same. The biggest change may be that we can now buy beer.

I don't want to re-ignite the old debate about this, but a good point of comparison is Gonzaga which built their 6,000 seat arena in 2004. If Wiki is correct, it cost them $25 million then, or the equivalent of $33.2 million today. $7 million for the 14,500 seat Joel was a steal, even with a few million bucks spent on some new lipstick. The land value alone is several million. And if we ever do want to build something smaller on campus, where would you put parking even for a 6,000 seat arena? There's not enough parking for just the students, faculty, and staff, some of whom have to park at the God Dome and even in the Groves Stadium parking lot and take a shuttle bus to campus. Most students have cars today (unlike back in our day).

Another example is the U of Miami's arena: 8,000 seats; built in 2003 for $48 million or $60.8 million in 2018 dollars. Again, the Joel deal was a steal for WFU.
Click to expand...

Y’all can feel the steam coming out of my ears can’t ya.
 
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