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The announcement that the Golden State Warriors will build a new basketball arena on Piers 30-32 in San Francisco by 2017 raised plenty of questions and we renot just talking about whether the team can actually score awinning season by then. Come on, people, we re not psychic. But here are some answers to your burning questions about the deal serious and not-so-serious alike. Question: How can these decrepit piers support a massive arena? A: Piers 30-32 may have pretty views, but the slabs of concrete themselves are downright wretched . Built to 1940s specifications, they re crumbling into the bay,and the port says they ll be condemned in 10 years without adramatic overhaul. Building a basketball arena on them sounds aboutas smart as spending $450 million, a league record, on thelackluster Golden State Warriors themselves. Oh, wait. Owners Joe Lacob and Peter Guber have studied the sight in depth and say they re confident thepiers can be sufficiently rehabbed. And they re spending $100million to do it. Nathan Ballard, spokesman for the project, said they reessentially building a brand new pier to today s strict seismicand construction standards. The current pier is strong enough to hold the constructionequipment needed for the project. Workers will drill 306 pillarsdown 130 to 180 feet beneath the water s surface to connect theunderbelly of the pier to the bedrock beneath it. Those pillars, each measuring 72 inches across, will be filled withcement, and a three-foot thick slab of cement will be placed on topof the pier. We re building a new pier that will be strong enough to hold theTaj Mahal, Ballard said. City officials are equally confident and say they hope the Warriorsadd their corporate headquarters and practice facilities to thepiers, too. Q: What do the San Francisco Giants have to say about all this? A: Tuesday s press conference featured a who s-who of cityofficials and sporting greats, but curiously absent were theWarriors soon-to-be-neighbors, the San Francisco Giants. Theydidn t even bring a basket of muffins as awelcome-to-the-neighborhood gift. Team CEO Larry Baer may be hesitant to publicly welcome theWarriors from Oakland after fighting the Oakland Athletics desired move from to San Jose. The Giants could also havelegitimate concerns about even worse traffic in the area andpotentially losing concerts and sponsors to the basketball arena. Also, the Giants and Warriors had previously been discussing thepossibility of the basketball team building an arena adjacent toAT&T Park. Giants spokeswoman Staci Slaughter said only, We re lookingforward to hearing the particulars of their proposal, but until wedo, we can t really comment. We hear there s been some private grumbling about the Warriors move from the baseball team, but Lacob and Guber (a Dodgers owner boo!) are pals of Baer and say they ve talked to him in recentdays and all is well. We look forward to a productive partnership with the Giants, Ballard said. The addition of the arena right down the block willcreate an entertainment, sports and restaurant zone like neverbefore in San Francisco. Q: Who spiked Guber s coffee on Tuesday morning? A: Nobody and we love it. Ever since Supervisor Chris Daly was termed out of office, we vemissed having a live wire around who could utter a crazilymemorable quote at any moment. (Who can forget It s on likeDonkey Kong! during the debate to name an interim mayor?) Enter Guber, an eccentric 7o-year-old Hollywood mogul with a thickBoston accent who dishes up very memorable lines. At my stage of life, I want it to be fun, he told the crowdgathered for the announcement of the arena project. The otherthree letter word starts with s and ends with x, and that s funtoo. He talked about meeting astronaut John Glenn early in his career. I said, When you re sitting on this Campbell soup can filledwith fuel at the beginning of this mission, what was going throughyour mind? He said, I was sitting there realizing there were amillion parts all built by the lowest bidder. I can assure youthis venue will not be built by the lowest bidder probably. The always corny Mayor Ed Lee was having fun, too. It s great to be reunited with my long-lost brother, separatedat birth, David Lee, the 5-foot-5-inch Chinese mayor said of the6-foot-9-inch white Warriors forward. Check out City Insider on Monday s for still more answers aboutthis perplexing deal. Will the Board of Supervisors use a Ouija board to determine what they think of it? Will the Warriors really keepGolden State in front of their name? And more! The e-commerce company in China offers quality products such as China Pearlized Envelopes , Kraft Paper Shopping Bags Manufacturer, and more. For more , please visit Kraft Bubble Mailer today!
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