[michigan83]

Originally Posted by Unsettomati

Seriously?

We're not talking about Soldier Field or the Rose Bowl here. This was not a historic stadium. It hosted an NFL team for a mere 27 seasons. It was a bland stadium devoid of character. The team that played there was bad to an epic degree, winning one playoff game over that span of time. They had only 8 winning seasons, four of them mediocre 9-7s, a pair of not-much-better 10-6s, and one 12-4 season (when they got crushed in the NFL title game).

It was a purely utilitarian building. The Hoosierdome and the Metrodome saw more drama and talented teams than ever did the Silverdome, and even they're not worthy of so much as a backward glance. And concerts? Domes are lousy locales for music.

The only 'heartbreaking' aspect to this is that politicians and the public have such screwed up priorities that they're willing to foot the bill to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars to build new stadiums for billionaires not because the middle-aged stadiums are no longer functional (they are more than functional) but because said billionaires can't quite squeeze as many millions out of them as they'd like.

Ok. I generally agree with you. But I also have that feeling that you get when someone is talking bad about a family member. It's OK when I do it, but not when someone else does it. There were some amazing memories in the Silverdome. When it was sold out it was probably the loudest place in the NFL. Barry Sanders made his magic there. Some of those seasons under Wayne Fontes were pretty entertaining.

So, yes, there is nothing "tragic" about the Silverdome falling apart. But... take it easy, man. Those are my childhood memories you are minimizing! And, just for the record, the Vikings and the Metrodome are just as big of a joke as the Lions. Sure, they failed in the Super Bowl at least, but failure is failure.

[Dave Wojo]

We were there in 2009 for a Bands Of America high school marching band competition. The band directors said they'd never go back to the "Echo Dome". In years after the band would travel further to go to venues that invested to make their stadiums more acoustically suited to these types of events.

Based on my experience there, I'm not surprised with where this ended up. My take: If you're going to re-purpose a stadium, and if you're hoping to have any chance of seeing repeat customers, you'd better make the necessary adjustments to make it a venue worth going to. Some hanging baffling to improve the acoustics would have made this a great venue.

[funymann]

I wanted to jump out of a plane and fall on the roof!! POOF!!!

Anyways, the air tight seal with revolving doors was toxic for truck and motor cycle events.

The air pressure was hard. Cooling was no where to be found. Just stuffy BO.

[limbor]

Many fond memories, including the World Cup, concerts, delightfully toxic monster truck rallies, and playing state championship football there but it was created during the age of auto-dependent sprawl in the 20th century and was doomed to fail.

Nothing but parking lots in all directions. No one thought to design it so businesses could develop around it, so families could get dinner or friends could grab a drink and leverage the income and tax revenue from the events.

FedEx Field outside DC for the Redskins was naively built on the same sprawl model 20 years later in the 90s. It's far morevsoulless and there's already serious talk about getting rid of it and moving the team back into the city.

Both the Silverdome and FedEx were short-sighted mistakes but least Detroit learned its lesson and built the beautiful Ford Field from the city's historic infrastructure, immersed in and feeding the energy of the city today. It will last generations.

And they did it all without impervious acres wasted on parking. Good memories from Pontiac, but best to keep them there.