Memorializing the Coliseum

L.A. Times Archives

Dec. 1, 2007 12 AM PT

The Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum is a grand historical building that should be preserved and modernized for the great USC football program. USC football and the Coliseum are two of the city’s prime assets.

On the other hand, the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum Commission is a relic that should be thrown on the ash heap of history.

John Smart

Los Angeles

I’ve had dealings with the Coliseum Commission and also with stadiums and arenas in Russia and East Germany during the height of communism.

It was a lot easier doing business with the folks in Eastern Europe than those on Figueroa Street.

Dan Rendant

Arcadia

If there is anyone out there who actually thinks that USC will move its football games to the Rose Bowl, I have some oceanfront property in the Midwest you may want to take a look at.

Jack Wolf

Westwood

To the Coliseum Commission, repeat after me:

I am an NFL-aholic.

I have this delusional belief the NFL will soon return to the Coliseum and I need help.

May my higher power grant me the wisdom to accept USC’s $100-million offer, and the serenity to accept the fact that the NFL will never, ever return to the Coliseum.

John Karmelich

Los Alamitos

Hasn’t enough public money been poured into the Coliseum already?

Obviously it’s time for the Coliseum Commission to bite the bullet, determine the cost of demolishing the current structure (leaving the peristyle as a monument), and work toward building a new stadium to house college and pro football as well as other attractions.

Sue Kamm

Los Angeles

USC flirted with the idea of moving to the Rose Bowl in 1982, the year that UCLA moved, and you can’t blame them. The Coliseum Commission is a hydra-headed bureaucracy whose goals are a fantasy at best (get an NFL team, get an NFL team that will pay for all the repairs and upgrades, give an NFL team pretty much every control that USC seeks), all of which are not in USC’s interests.

Bill Plaschke says in his Wednesday column that the “Rose Bowl . . . has done little for the UCLA football mystique.” To the contrary, UCLA became a consistent winner after 1982, went to the Jan. 1 Rose Bowl several times in the next decade, sold many more season tickets, improved recruiting and provided an environment that encouraged alumni support in a way that the Coliseum never did.

The key difference between the Coliseum and the Rose Bowl is captured in Sam Farmer’s front-page story Wednesday, as Rose Bowl operating company president Bill Thomson says “But we’re not going to do something without UCLA’s full agreement.” Words that were never spoken or even thought of by the Coliseum with respect to the two universities in 1982.

Alan Charles

UCLA vice chancellor

(retired)

The Trojans should just head to Angel Stadium. Then they can change their name to the Southern California Trojans of Anaheim.

Devin Magee

Anaheim