Weekly Stockyards rodeos at risk, but new Cowtown Coliseum events waiting in wings
Cowtown Coliseum is set to change hands this week, and nobody is saying much about the deal.
“I think that’s because it’s a done deal — I’m just afraid we’re going to lose the rodeo,” said former City Councilman Jim Lane, talking about the weekly Stockyards rodeo and related coliseum events.
The council will vote Tuesday to go along with a new agreement switching management of the 111-year-old city coliseum from the rodeo promoters to the developers of the new Mule Alley shopping center across Exchange Avenue.
The contract is vague about plans for the coliseum. It describes only “a broad variety of on-brand western entertainment and other programming” to draw guests to the forthcoming Hotel Drover.
It does not say anything about the Stockyards Championship Rodeo or Pawnee Bill’s Wild West Show, a low-rated re-enactment of old-time rodeo acts.
“We’ll still have some type of rodeo there, and other horseback events and shows,” Mayor Betsy Price said Saturday. “The idea is to drive more usage of the coliseum.”
Lane is worried about losing the Stockyards Championship Rodeo, a weekly pro-am event that has drawn cowboys, families and tourists to the Stockyards since 1986.
“Back when nobody wanted to be in the Stockyards, that rodeo is what brought the real cowboys back,” Lane said, talking about the 1980s, when regular cattle sales ended and the historic district was at risk of losing its connection to the past.
“Now, everybody wants in on the Stockyards.”
Price said she expects Mule Alley to offer a rodeo at the coliseum maybe “once or twice a month” and also expand other programming.
There’s been little public discussion because the Mule Alley owners are buying out the rodeo promoters, “and it just now got to the point where city action was required,” she said.
I sent Facebook messages to several rodeo and Wild West Show participants. All said they hadn’t been told about any potential change.
But here on the verge of a new decade, change is everywhere at the 129-year-old Stockyards.
Nowhere is that more obvious than on East Exchange Avenue, where across from the 1908 coliseum, home of the first indoor rodeo, is a bright green neon sign for the forthcoming Mule Alley location of New York-based Shake Shack.
The $175 million shopping center has attracted a brewpub-music hall by Dallas-based Twisted Root Burger Co. and Truck Yard; El Paso-based Lucchese Bootmaker and upscale Lucchese Collection shops; and the new home of advertising technology company Simpli.fi, along with the RIDE TV network, restaurants and the American Paint Horse Association.
Besides the Drover, a new SpringHill Suites hotel is also near opening nearby at 2315 N. Main St., with a rooftop bar and a chef Tim Love menu.
The new projects bring new jobs for a north side that needs them. They also bring economic development for a business district that 1980s investors like Steve Murrin, also a former councilman, and White Elephant Saloon founder Joe Dulle rescued from ruin.
“Steve built the coliseum from a place people didn’t care about back into a place people want to go,” Lane said.
“When we made a deal with [coliseum manager] Hub Baker for the rodeo, he was out there trying to save the Stockyards.”
Then called North Side Coliseum, the arena was hosting only a weekly pro wrestling card. The facility had barely been repaired or updated since the Stock Show Rodeo moved to the west side after the 1942 finals.
Price, a supporter of the Mule Alley development and efforts to bring more tourists and success to the Stockyards, said the change will be good for the coliseum.
“I think they’ll see what programming fits and bring more people into the coliseum,” Price said.
“The hotel’s coming along. Mule Alley is looking great. I know things are changing, but things change as the economy changes.”
Lord knows the Stockyards needed new stores, new entertainment and new ways to lure tourists. But it also needs real cowboys.
This story was originally published December 14, 2019 at 3:33 PM.
