New Haven Coliseum
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The New Haven Coliseum is a sports-entertainment facility located in downtown New Haven, Connecticut. Its formal name is Veterans Memorial Coliseum, but most locals simply refer to it as "the Coliseum". It occupies 4.5 acres (18,000 m²) of land adjacent to the Knights of Columbus headquarters building and faces the Oak Street Connector/Route 34 downtown spur.
The Coliseum was built from 1970-1972 and was designed by the architects Kevin Roche / John Dinkeloo & Associates. One interesting aspect of the facility's design is that the parking lots for visitors to the Coliseum were constructed on top of the actual Coliseum structure. Other features of the design, such as street storefronts and an exhibition hall, were never completed. The Coliseum could hold 11,171 people at full capacity.
The Coliseum hosted events from 1972 to when it closed on September 1, 2002. The structure of the parking garages had deteriorated to the point where large canvas rectangles had to be attached to the outside to catch pieces of concrete which would occasionally drop off onto the sidewalk below. The city shut the facility down after concluding that it was a drain on city coffers. However, the city did not hold any public hearings, referendum votes, or conduct any legitimate surveys, and opposition to city demolition plans continues to grow. Several groups, local stakeholders, and the Coalition to Save Our Coliseum are mounting a campaign to save and renovate the Coliseum. See [1] (http://www.newhavencoliseum.com).
The city has tentative plans to demolish the Coliseum to make room for a new downtown/Long Wharf redevelopment plan. Heretofore, the Coliseum has not been demolished as the state has refused to award the $6.5 million that the city has requested, and remains empty and darkened to this day.