Dallas Cowboys Stadium (orginally posted December 6, 2010)

 
     I got my first chance to be inside the new Cowboys Stadium in Arlington, Texas for the Big XII Championship game on December 4, 2010.  As a Huskers fan, I was disappointed in the outcome of the game, but it was great fun being inside that facility, which is something like the Disneyworld of Stadiums.  The stadium looks like a giant spaceship from the outside, complete with a retractable roof that opens onto massive bridge support-like tracks.  From the outside, one could expect a grand roof opening with the Cowboy greats of the past ascending out... Tom Landry, Roger Staubach, even Dandy Don Meredith who just passed away this weekend (R.I.P. Don).  Inside, the facility features the famous Giant Screens (two large, two smaller).  One is tempted to watch the entire game on the big televisions, but you need to look at the action on the field, because there is literally not a bad seat in the house (and the seats are comfortable, too).  Really, the only criticism I would offer concerns parking.  Although there seems to be plenty of lot space, the traffic flow out could be improved.  The lots are immediately adjacent to the streets, with no built-in ingress and egress drives so that parking lot workers can control flow.  Of course, to make this happen, the Cowboys would probably have to buy up a few more square blocks of property around the stadium.  But traffic jams and sporting events go hand-in-hand, and perhaps we have all come to expect this.  If you've not been to this marvel, I highly recommend it.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Space Shuttle Discovery and Our Future (originally posted March 9, 2011) The Space Shuttle Discovery touched down at Florida's Kennedy Space Center today, March 9, 2011, at 11:57 AM.  This landing marks the final mission for the nation's oldest shuttle vehicle, and with only two shuttle missions remaining, one each for Endeavour and Atlantis , NASA's shuttle program comes to an end.  This era will be replaced by U.S. astronauts hitching rides with the Russian space program to get to the International Space Station, by launching satellites through already-existing NASA and commercial rockets, and by a push for Mars exploration.  But, as the New York Times opines:  "What sort of spaceship might ultimately replace the shuttle is an open question, and it is not yet clear how NASA will fare in the ongoing budget debate."  http://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.nytimes.com%2F2011%2F03%2F10%2Fscience%2Fspace%2F10shuttle.html%3F_r%3D1%26hp&sa=D&s...
Read more
Finding Hope In High School Papers (originally posted March 1, 2011) Through one of my volunteer associations, I've been asked to judge papers for the 2011 National History Day .  This year, the theme is "Debate and Diplomacy:  Successes, Failures, and Consequences."  The first challenge for me in judging the work of high-schoolers is this:  I am not a teacher.  I have been telling myself that some portion of my second career in public service should involve teaching, but the fact of the matter is that I have never taught for a living.  The exercise of sorting through the writings of students reminds me that teachers, though much-maligned of late, have a pretty tough job.  And by the way, reading the voluntary works of willing students is probably one of the activities a professional teacher would actually relish.  There are plenty of less-than-pleasant daily tasks in which teachers must engage.         I must ...
Read more

We Should Have Seen this Coming (Unformed Thoughts)

          As I write this, I glanced at the Johns-Hopkins University "COVID-19 Global Cases" interactive map. As of right now (26 March, at 9:30 AM EDT, there are 487,648 confirmed cases worldwide, with 22,030 deaths. That is a death rate of about 4.5 percent. The U.S has 69,197 cases, with 938 deaths, a death rate of 1.4 percent. However, it seems clear from tracking the interactive map, the U.S. will overtake first Italy, and then China, in number of cases, in the next week or so. It is significant because China has a population four times larger than that of the U.S.           Here is the thing--we should have seen this coming. One of the benefits of American federalism is that state governors actually have power. South Korea has a much more top-down form of federalism. Thus, South Korea's government proved quite effective in testing its population for this virus. In the U.S., our brand of federalism is a lot more messy. Gover...
Read more