In move to Plano, Dallas Stars searching for solution to DFW’s greatest problem
Satan’s winning bingo card reads: “183, 287, 121, 820, 635, 20, 30, 35.”
Throw in the words “toll way” or “George Bush” and residents of North Texas are liable to burst into tears, for there is no rubric to the equation of driving anywhere in Dallas-Fort Worth does not come with pain, suffering, and money.
After a first, second and third look at the artist renderings of the proposed new arena for the Dallas Stars in Plano, you’ll get a migraine when you think about the drive, followed by panic attacks over the thought of where to park.
“What we can’t do is hand out 18,000 parking passes for 18,000 parking spots,” Dallas Stars president Brad Alberts told the Star-Telegram this week.
As of today, that’s how it looks.
This week, the city of Plano unanimously passed a measure to give the Stars $700 million to build a new arena and entertainment complex at the site of the Shops at Willow Bend. This has been the worst secret in DFW sports for more than a year, and the announcement confirms the team to intends to leave the American Airlines Center when the lease expires in the spring of 2031.
The biggest priority for the Stars and the city of Plano is to create decent solutions to what is now this region’s most dreaded challenge — traffic, and parking.
“If you ask me today, transportation and traffic is No. 1 on our list of concerns,” Alberts said. “We all realize that from a fan experience, this location has to be better than the American Airlines Center. We can’t have people stuck at 635 and the tollway moving at 2 miles per hour.”
Godspeed.
The Stars’ future and DFW traffic
The biggest reason the Stars are leaving for Plano is a free $700 million, and the chance to co-own a real estate development. Dallas could not come close to offering what Plano did to recruit the Stars.
Another reason — this is where Stars fans live. After the Stars moved here from Minnesota, the consistent growth of their fanbase, and their most stable area, has been Collin County. As this region continues to grow, they believe Plano will be more of a central area.
Their issue now is the legal torture device that is DFW traffic. It does not matter the day, or the time, it’s all awful; now weekends are no longer sacred. Interstate 30 is a drag strip full of sedans, SUVs, pickup trucks and 18-wheelers that combine to move at the average speed of 23 mph.
Interstate 35, W or E, is a Quentin Tarantino movie.
The commute, and cost, to DFW Airport is longer, and more expensive, than most flights. The tollways cost $20 just to save three minutes. Interstate 20 moves just fine, if you’re near Abilene.
The new Stars arena will be located off the Dallas autobahn, more commonly called the Dallas North Tollway, which over the last decade has become one of the busiest main roads in DFW.
“We need to figure out a realistic option to minimize, or to get, people off the tollway,” Alberts said. “There will be some aspect of public transportation there. I know it won’t be a DART station. That would not be there by 2031.”
One of the best features to the American Airlines Center is that it’s easily accessible by train; the Victory Plaza station is a tremendous feature for fans. There is nothing remotely like this at the Shops at Willow Bend, which is an area that was built for cars so people could park and walk around a mall.
There are currently two DART stations in Plano, both of which are approximately 10 miles east of the Stars’ new site. The closest light rail option is a station in Addison, which is 6.2 miles south.
“We’re talking about 2031, so who knows what ride-share will look like by then; we have robots that drive cars now, and in five years technology will advance this,” Alberts said. “The city is committed to getting this right. We’ve already started this conversation because this is a very, very important aspect to this.
“We get why this is a concern, and we have to deliver.”
The Stars are not the Arizona Coyotes
A fear circulating since this announcement is that the Stars moving to the suburbs will go “as well” as the Coyotes’ move from Phoenix to the suburb of Glendale, Arizona.
In 2003, the Coyotes left downtown Phoenix for a new entertainment district that had an arena, and a football stadium for the Arizona Cardinals in suburban Glendale. The Cardinals are still there, but the development bombed for the Coyotes.
Glendale is the ‘burbs, the team didn’t win much since it moved to Arizona from Winnipeg in 1996, and what fans there were all lived in the east valley. They didn’t want to make the 45-minute drive to Glendale.
The ownership situation with the franchise was unstable, at best, and in 2022 the team moved to Arizona State’s 5,000-seat Mullett Arena. An NHL team playing in a 5,000-seat arena was an embarrassment, and the team never could land a deal for a new arena. The Coyotes moved to Salt Lake City last year, where they are now the Utah Mammoth.
“That example could not be any more different than this one,” Alberts said.
The Stars may be moving from Dallas to Plano, but under no reasonable, or unreasonable, scenario will this move lead to their departure from Texas. Part of the Stars’ legacy is that their success here triggered the NHL’s expansion into warm-weather cities.
And solving that is nothing compared to figuring out DFW traffic.
