Everyone connected the dots in May when the New York Yankees and Manchester City partnered to join Major League Soccer, establishing a second team for New York.
The dot connecting came in the venue site selection process. Previously, MLS was bullish on a 25,000-seat stadium inside Flushing Meadow-Corona Park in Queens.
The problem is that any Flushing Meadow project could not happen without the blessing of the Mets, which would need to partner in the project’s parking element. That would mean Mets ownership assisting a Yankees project, something not far from End Times stuff.
So the project was in trouble the day New York City FC was born.
Today, a city councilman and Queens Borough President candidate said the $340 million project was officially kaput. The Daily News quoted Leroy Comrie as saying: “The location doesn’t work. There was no real benefit for Queens residents to site it in that location.”
Comrie, who also chairs the council’s Land Use Committee, then begins talking up the land near Yankees Stadium. It should be noted, however, that Comrie has been an outspoken critic of the Flushing Meadows stadium project from the outset.
Today’s Daily News story also has more quotes from Bronx Borough President Ruben Diaz Jr., who was happy to help push the Flushing Meadows project further over the ledge; he has tried to steer MLS and commissioner Don Garber toward his area since the May announcement.