Heads and tales: Field of pipe dreams
By Wade Kwon
If you make it, they might come: American City Business Journals studied 179 major cities to see if their total personal income could support pro teams. Birmingham, with a total personal income of $48.1 billion, makes the cut for football, basketball, hockey and soccer — but not baseball, which apparently isn’t affordable in any market. The report acknowledges other factors would affect attracting a franchise, such as stadium availability and proximity to existing franchises. A huge strike against Birmingham is population: Not enough eyeballs in the market to watch in person or on television. Also, much bigger cities are ahead of us in desirability. Also available: study overview | spreadsheet (MS Excel) | 10 most overextended markets.
• Birmingham is wealthy enough for pro sports team, study shows [Birmingham Business Journal]
Flame war: Ten burned churches, 200 investigators, $30,000 reward, more than 400 leads — and no arrests. (Except for a copycat mentally retarded/ill suspect, whose brother is a volunteer firefighter.) Jim Cavanaugh, head of the ATF field division in Nashville, leads the task force based at the Tuscaloosa Airport — and is better known as the hostage negotiator who talked with David Koresh by phone during the 1993 Waco standoff. Meanwhile, residents are keeping close watch on their own churches.
• U.S. Mounts a Vast Hunt for Church Arsonists [New York Times]
Of fairways and speedways: Do country clubbers like to cheer on Dale Jr. in the No. 8 car? Do NASCAR fans like to shoot birdies (the other kind)? That’s the promotional push behind Alabama Speedweek, touting April 21-30 as a dream week of golf and NASCAR/motorbike racing for fans. We’re gonna put up the caution flag and suggest that the only thing these two groups share is … well, flags.
• ‘Alabama Speedweek’ packages state’s golf, racing attractions [Birmingham Business Journal]
Also:
- Elementary school locker raid turns up 11 guns, 3 knives, 1 textbook on evolution
- Weekend visit to Georgia refreshes, relaxes uptight human resources manager
- Transit board misses meeting because of heavy traffic
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