There have been conversations about an arena going back to the late 1990's. A lot of things have changed since Hogan first floated the idea of an off campus events center similar to Spokane Arena, but I think there is little desire to broach the idea again both on campus and off of it. Cost being one thing and control is another.
UM couldn't fashion together the 100 million plus capital campaign to do that in the 90's and the costs probably in excess of 500 million now. They couldn't get the 30 million needed to ideally redo the adams center the first time around, and they've been piecing it all together since then. I do believe there is a plan for thenorth end of the arena, to improve fan experience/concessions and further improve the concert/event hosting abilities but that has been on the back burner for quite a while now. Campus politics, monetary constraints has made it difficult for the athletic department to engage in university funded capital projects like that for nearly 20 years now. Gotta come from private entities, and they have been only able to fund it on small project basis for the Adams Center. Took them 20 years to get the womens locker rooms done.
My understanding the focus on private capital fund raising is all on improving the press boxes and suites on the west side of WaGriz first. Also on that list are upgrading the fan facing elements of Wa-Griz as well (restrooms, concessions, etc). I think that is next on the list of must do's, before they would even consider inside of Adams center renovations.
