The apocalypse that recently shook much of downtown Phoenix and the world is not expected to affect Super Bowl festivities, city officials said Friday.
Phoenix Mayor Greg Stanton said he is used to people regarding downtown Phoenix as “boring,” but the apocalypse could even be seen as part of downtown Phoenix’s revitalization efforts.
“We’re currently in the middle of revitalizing downtown, but as we’ve seen before, big events like pre-Super Bowl festivities draw people from outside downtown Phoenix to the area,” Stanton said. “We’re confident that this massive swath of destruction won’t impede on either the revitalization efforts or the Super Bowl festivities.”
Not everyone was as optimistic about the situation as Stanton. Several members of the Super Bowl’s host committee visited downtown Phoenix on Thursday to scout facilities and further plan the festivities, committee member John Smith said. He said he was outraged that the city failed to inform the committee of the apocalypse’s utter ruination of the city.
“If we had known that downtown Phoenix had become more of a desert wasteland, we never, ever would have scheduled the pre-game events here,” Smith said. “We would’ve gone somewhere more vibrant. Like Mesa.”
A major issue with the apocalypse is that there will be no one to operate the venues where the festivities would take place, Smith said, and out-of-state visitors may be turned off by the complete lack of human life in the area. Stanton dismissed the notion.
“We’ve heard this before, that there’s no nightlife in downtown Phoenix, that there’s nothing to do,” Stanton said. “It simply isn’t true. Downtown is a bustling urban core, and it’s ridiculous to think something as insignificant as the complete and utter destruction of the city’s infrastructure would change that.”
City Councilwoman Kate Gallego said keeping the Super Bowl festivities in downtown Phoenix would bring an economic boost to the area and be an exciting experience for the residents as well. According to disaster-relief numbers, downtown Phoenix currently has 12 surviving residents.
“I can’t think of a better way to show visitors to Phoenix the spirit of the urban core than by hosting the Super Bowl parties here,” Gallego said. “I don’t think this widespread annihilation of everything we know and love will affect it at all. If anything, it gives us an opportunity to show visitors how vibrant downtown Phoenix truly is.”
Despite the mayor and councilwoman’s optimism, city records indicate reservations at city-owned facilities, such as the Phoenix Convention Center and the Sheraton Phoenix Downtown Hotel, have taken a nosedive, with less than 2 percent of each venue scheduled to be occupied during the Super Bowl.
Former downtown Phoenix resident Scott Johnson, who relocated to Mesa prior to the apocalypse, said it would be better for the Super Bowl festivities to take place in another city.
“This is the city once again not giving the downtown community, dead or alive, a voice,” Johnson said. “You know things are bad when the Super Bowl host committee wants to host events in Mesa, of all places.”