Is stadium key to RSL success?

As Dave Checketts said Saturday, "We are a long, long, long, long, long way from throwing in the towel on Real Salt Lake."

The team owner's confirmation that Soccer City, USA, will still be built in Sandy, Utah, comes after three days of relative silence from Utah's first Major League Soccer team. Last Wednesday, the county pulled $35 million in hotel room tax funds because it would end up costing more than double that amount in interest. Although it's another "necessary" bump in the project, Checketts said in a Saturday press conference that he plans to continue negotiations with the county to find a way to make stadium financing work.

Real still hopes public dollars will fund $45 million of the proposed $145 million, 22-acre stadium project. Team officials say the facility will bring jobs, economic benefits and notoriety to the state, but will Soccer City, USA, live up to team officials' promises?

Glowing expectations of economic development surround the stadium and adjoining hotel and broadcast studio, but after documents leaked last month to the Deseret Morning News revealed Real is losing millions, one fact shined through: Real needs a stadium to make money.

Major League Soccer hopes to have a stadium for each team in the league. By 2010, when the 12-team league is expected to expand to 16, nine soccer stadiums will have been built across the United States and one in Toronto, Canada. Teams with stadiums turn a larger profit than those without, said MLS Commissioner Don Garber. Currently, the Los Angeles Galaxy, who play at their own stadium in Carson, Calif., are the only team making a profit, he added.

Every MLS stadium currently operating or being built has been funded with some form of public dollars, whether it be donated land, environmental cleanup or multimillions from the government. Real officials have continually said a stadium cannot be built without some form of public funding. Their plan is to use those dollars for infrastructure costs, rather than work on the stadium itself.

The team has optimism on their side. Coming off a losing season, Real has enjoyed a strong fan base in Salt Lake City, the smallest market in the league. And with three successful MLS stadiums, that could slate Sandy to receive the same kind of economic benefits. But regardless of how the Sandy stadium is financed, officials and residents wonder whether building it will truly bring windfalls to the well-established suburb.