After months of negotiations, the NFL's Tennessee Titans and government officials agreed to initial terms to build a new domed stadium in downtown Nashville surrounded by acreage to be developed into green space, housing, retail and other uses.
The Titans are expected to construct the 60,000-seat enclosed stadium next to its existing home at Nissan Stadium on a site across the Cumberland River from Nashville’s entertainment district. The team will pay about 40% of construction costs for the $2.1 billion new stadium, with the city of Nashville, the state of Tennessee and a new hotel tax funding the rest.
The Titans join the Chicago Bears in trying to replace outdated facilities with stadiums that generate more revenue and can host major sporting events such as the Super Bowl, college football playoffs and NCAA basketball Final Four games. New stadiums typically offer more dining options, improved broadband connections and better seating.
But the new stadiums also usually involve navigating lengthy and complex deals for public financing. In the case of the Titans, Nashville and Davidson County, which work together as a single metropolitan government, were on the hook to spend up to $1.95 billion to renovate Nissan Stadium under the terms of the Titans' existing lease that runs through 2039, according to a Monday statement.
Rather than spend public funds to renovate Nissan Stadium, government officials decided to build a new facility that will be partially financed by private capital. The agreement still requires the approval of the 40-member Metropolitan Council of Nashville and Davidson County at a vote scheduled for later this year, according to the statement.
“Renovating the current stadium proved to be financially irresponsible, so we are proposing a new stadium” that is expected to use zero dollars from the local government's operating budget, Mayor John Cooper said in the statement.
The Deal
If approved, the Titans will sign a 30-year lease for the new stadium that is expected to open as early as 2026. Nashville-based Tennessee State University's football team will play up to four games at the new stadium each season.
The agreement includes the Titans returning about 66 acres the team owns, including the existing Nissan Stadium site, to the city to be developed. The city plans to demolish the existing Nissan Stadium and build a park, greenways, affordable housing and shops, according to the statement.
"Land that would have remained surface parking for the next 17 years can now serve Nashville," the city said in the statement.
Nashville leaders have long eyed the area along the Cumberland River’s east bank for redevelopment. The East Bank neighborhood is also expected to be home to a $1.2 billion campus under development by software maker Oracle Corp. at the River North site.
The Titans and the NFL are expected to provide $840 million for the new stadium, the state of Tennessee agreed to provide $500 million and the city government will provide $760 million from new revenue bonds from the local sports authority and from a new 1% hotel tax.
The Titans also will waive $32 million of unpaid bills they're owed for construction and maintenance of the existing Nissan Stadium and will be financially responsible for maintenance at the new stadium. The Titans have also agreed to cover any construction cost overruns for the new stadium and will pay off $30 million in bonds owed on the existing stadium. Some of the Titans' financial contribution to the new stadium will come from the sale of personal seat licenses, a document that gives holders the right to purchase season tickets.
The existing Nissan Stadium opened in 1999. Meanwhile, the proposed new facility comes as professional stadiums have increasingly short lifespans. Atlanta demolished the 25-year-old Georgia Dome in 2017 and replaced it the same year with the $1.6 billion Mercedes-Benz Stadium next door. In contrast, the San Francisco 49ers played in Candlestick Park for 54 years.
Many teams use the threat of leaving town to leverage a new stadium from their current cities or to get one built at the city they relocate to. The Titans' billionaire owner, Amy Adams Strunk, said in a Monday letter sent to Mayor Cooper that she and her family never considered the possibility of relocating the team outside of Nashville.
The Titans ownership said in the statement that its goal for the new stadium is to place the citizens and taxpayers of Nashville in a better position than they are under the current lease, create an "amazing facility for Nashville and Tennessee that will attract world-class events" and to return valuable real estate surrounding the stadium to the government to develop "an unprecedented new riverfront neighborhood."
For the Record
Venue Solutions Group, based in Brentwood, Tennessee, advised Nashville mayor's office and the Metropolitan Government of Nashville and Davidson County on financial and stadium issues.