By DJ Cence

As a follow up to winning the elusive Larry O’Brien trophy in 2024, Boston Celtics’ owner Wyc Grousbeck has communicated that he plans to sell the team after 22 years of ownership. As one of the most storied franchises in all of sports, not to mention a key part of the Boston economic landscape, this sale naturally creates much interest among Celtics fans and the city at large.

With a new ownership group in place, will there be the same level of investment in uber-expensive players like Jaylen Brown, Jayson Tatum, and Kristaps Porzingis? Will the level of community giving and engagement drop in an effort to save wallets and recuperate from the expected $5 billion asking price? And most importantly, will the team remain at TD Garden as they have since 1995, or will they seek a team-owned arena to cement the new era?

The rationale for a new arena is straightforward. Whereas TD Garden is owned by Delaware North, a new arena would enable the team to collect all of its gameday revenue, rather than sharing the spoils with Bruins ownership. As the lone, or at least primary tenant, the Celtics ownership would also call the shots on the events calendar.  

On the heels of positive momentum for a new stadium for the New England Revolution in Everett, let’s consider what a move for the Boston Celtics would require through the lenses of real estate.

Sizing Up the Space

Firstly, a new arena would require the identification of a site to suit the venue and offer an enjoyable destination for fans. When thinking about new locations, Boston likely cannot offer parcels of buildable land necessary to construct this new arena. For context, NBA arenas can be north of 500,000 square feet so, identifying somewhere in the city that can support a comparably sized development in terms of seating, plus any parking needs, would be very challenging.  

This creates a very possible scenario that the team would have to look beyond the city’s borders. While a location in Greater Boston suburb will certainly offer more free space for an arena, we can’t be sure how a relocation would go over with fans and city leadership. Setting aside the symbolic and political questions, this scenario raises a second factor that must be considered.

Transportation access

TD Garden sits above a major transportation hub, North Station. With trains on the Orange and Green lines, several commuter rails, and an Amtrak train (the Downeaster), North Station is well-suited to get fans to and from Celtics games. In the 2023-2024 season, TD Garden saw an average of 19,000 fans per game.

With fans having enjoyed this high level of accessibility for generations, it would present a challenge to reduce that in a new arena site. Unfortunately, it is even more difficult to identify another location that offers a comparable level of access. As we see with Gillette Stadium, which sits on a Commuter Rail stop, public transportation to the stadium can be infrequent and the service provided may not translate to the schedule of an NBA franchise.

For a location located in Greater Boston, ownership could decide to invest in building a commuter rail station near their new site, not unlike Boston Landing near the Celtics’ practice facility in Brighton. This would enhance accessibility for future fans while also offering a significant benefit to the host community. The Boston Landing commuter rail station cost approximately $20 million to build, however construction took place in more favorable economic conditions, so we could expect a potential new station to come with higher costs.   

Entertainment and Attraction

An increasingly important consideration for sports venues is the gameday experience for fans, specifically what they are doing before and after the game. While Fenway Park and TD Garden have seen a flurry of entertainment-focused development activity in recent years, their locations in downtown Boston offer access to patrons regardless of whether a game is happening.

Instead, a good case study for the Celtics would be Gillette Stadium. Foxborough is by no means a destination on its own, but what it offered was a relatively clean slate to construct one. The Patriots ownership has managed to do exactly that by building a bustling entertainment ecosystem around the stadium with retail, restaurants, and  to draw in fans beyond the handful of home games in the football season. Additionally, the stadium boasts a sprawling parking complex, a feature that would not be possible in the inner city of Boston, but likely would be possible in a suburban location.

If the Celtics decided to move outside of Boston, there would need to be thoughtful conversations with their host community on what the team and arena can do beyond basketball games. Additionally, as we saw with the Everett stadium, pushback from owners of Fenway and TD Garden specifically focused on competition for concert acts in the city.

If there is not an opportunity to build similar infrastructure around their new arena, it may not make sense for a municipality to set aside such a significant chunk of land for 41 games.

Neighborhood Impact

When thinking about new locations, we must consider the quality of life of those who’d neighbor a new arena. Sporting events are routinely attended by rowdy fans whose noisemaking does not always decrease when they step outside of a venue. The conduct of patrons as they traverse a residential area can degrade relationships with the community and would need to be mitigated at a minimum, if not outright neutralized, to maintain a positive bond.

There are very few neighborhoods in the city that would welcome such an introduction on residents, which could also include issues with parking, safety, and public consumption.

Last Considerations

While the star power and tax revenue generated by the arena could soften concerns of the resident impacts in certain neighborhoods or suburban communities, it is important to understand the greater impact this move would have on the city, the fans, and the new location and its residents.

A move like this carries great interest for the Celtics given their stature, and while it might be enticing to go off on their own and build a new arena or Celtics’ branded shopping center, the grass might not be greener for the franchise anywhere outside of the Garden. So, with that in mind, the future new owners of the Celtics should think carefully before making a move, you might already have the best deal in Boston sports.