Coliseum Trying to See if Turning a Parking Lot into a Drive-in is Economically Feasible

The chances that A's fans will be able to watch their team play in a Coliseum parking lot modified into a drive-in are improving, at least a little. The group is exploring if such a use is economically feasible. If it is so deemed, expect the plan to go forward. But beware. Walmart is considering getting into the drive-in game.

The Coliseum Authority is going ahead with explorations on how to turn one of the Coliseum parking lots into a drive-in theater that could, among other benefits, provide A’s fans with a chance to get out of their houses and see games on the big screen.

Henry Gardner, interim executive director of the Coliseum Authority, said Sunday his group is putting together numbers to see if they make financial sense. Fans are being excluded from actually being in the Coliseum when the A's play for the duration of the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic.

He’s also heard that the Walmart corporation is getting into the drive-in game, and if Walmart was to do that in Oakland or San Leandro, that might be enough to keep the Coliseum project from going forward.

“First of all, we’re running the numbers and putting together a paper that has an outline saying that `here are the kinds of uses that could be permitted,’” Gardner said. “We’d be following the directives of the county health office or the governor’s directives; whichever standards are higher.”

Gardner said using the parking lot as a drive-in home for the A’s, which was first proposed by SI.com, “is a very creative idea,” and it meshes with Oakland City Council member Rebecca Kaplan, who has envisioning the parking lot as a place both for drive-in movies and for socially distanced gatherings for churches and other local groups.

He went on to say that the Coliseum Authority has to make sure it can make a profit on the venture, because 2020, with the Raiders and Warriors having left and the COVID-19 coronavirus shutting everything else down has meant Coliseum Authority revenues are taking a beating.

“There’s nobody who’s going to take on an enterprise here if it’s going to lose money,” he said. “Would Walmart? I don’t know. But I know that we wouldn’t.”

Gardner says 55 percent of the Coliseum Authority’s staff is currently out of work. That alone makes the idea of getting one of the parking lots renovated for a project like this and enabling more people to start working again is a winner.

Follow Athletics insider John Hickey on Twitter: @JHickey3

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