Astrodome Might Be Astrodone

I cannot stand to watch “big business” get in the way of a legacy. It seems that this is what “institutions” such as the Houston Texans and Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo have been reduced to for fear of any type of competition. The Houston Astrodome is that legacy that is in jeopardy of just being reduced to a memory due to big business ways.

The shell of the former glory of the Astrodome still stands and has hopes of a $450 million renovation into a tourist attraction - a hotel with 1,300 rooms, food courts and amusement rides. Yet, two key players that need to sign off on the half-a-billion dollar deal are the less than glorious Houston Texans and the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo.

‘Not until we saw their plans recently did we realize that this project has the ability to cannibalize our operations,’ said Leroy Shafer, the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo's chief operating officer. ‘Every dollar spent that is spent there is one that might not be spent at the rodeo.’

To “cannibalize [their] operations” that come around once-a-year? The mark up on their concessions and parking for that once-a -year event is enough to put them out of business? I never once thought that out of all the shady business deals that concessions and parking were going to become the monopoly. Forget media convergence and the FCC, this is what the focus needs to be shifted to – the back-door.

Yet a poll taken by County Judge Ed Emmett’s office said that 84 percent of county residents are against the razing of the Houston Astrodome. Can the Texans or the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo claim those type of numbers? I don't think so.

The Astrodome is a part of our history as individuals and as a city. There are millions of fans who have walked the circle that is the Astrodome and can still remember the first time they saw their hero take the field. Destroying it would be destroying a piece of every Houstonian that sat in one of those orange seats,