The Meadowlands Home of the New York Giants | |
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 Giants Stadium during the 1994 FIFA World Cup | |
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| Address | 50 Route 120 |
|---|---|
| Location | East Rutherford, New Jersey |
| Coordinates | 40°48′44″N 74°4′37″W / 40.81222°N 74.07694°W |
| Owner | New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority |
| Operator | New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority |
| Capacity | 80,242[1] |
| Surface | |
| Construction | |
| Broke ground | November 19, 1972[1] |
| Opened | October 10, 1976 |
| Closed | January 3, 2010 (final game) |
| Demolished | February 4 – August 10, 2010 |
| Construction cost | US$78 million ($418 million in 2023 dollars[2]) |
| Architect |
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| General contractor | George A. Fuller Company[1] |
| Tenants | |
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Giants Stadium (sometimes referred to as Giants Stadium at the Meadowlands) was a stadium located in East Rutherford, New Jersey, in the Meadowlands Sports Complex. The venue was open from 1976 to 2010, and primarily hosted sporting events and concerts. It was the home field of the New York metropolitan area's two National Football League teams, the New York Giants (from 1976 to 2009) and the New York Jets (from 1984 to 2009). It also was the home field of two New York metro area professional soccer teams, the NASL's New York Cosmos (from 1977 to 1984) and Major League Soccer's New York Red Bulls (from 1996 to 2009).
The stadium's maximum seating capacity was 80,242.[3] The structure was 756 feet (230 m) long, 592 feet (180 m) wide and 144 feet (44 m) high from service level to the top of the seating bowl and 178 feet (54 m) high to the top of the south tower. The volume of the stadium was 64.5 million cubic feet (1,830,000 m3), and 13,500 tons of structural steel were used in the building process while 29,200 tons of concrete were poured.[4] It was owned and operated by the New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority (NJSEA). The stadium's field was aligned northwest to southeast, with the press box along the southwest sideline.
In the early 1970s, the New York Giants were sharing Yankee Stadium with the New York Yankees baseball team, and began looking for a home of their own. The Giants struck a deal with the fledgling New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority in 1971 and broke ground on the construction of the new facility in 1972. The Giants' last full season in Yankee Stadium was 1972, as the ballpark was closed for a massive reconstruction following the end of the Yankees' 1973 season. Since their new stadium would take a significant amount of time to finish, and they could not use their home facility due to the construction, the Giants moved out of state and played in New Haven, Connecticut at the Yale Bowl from October 1973 through 1974, but won just once in twelve games there. They returned to New York for one final season in 1975 and shared Shea Stadium in Flushing, Queens, with the Yankees, Mets, and Jets. The Giants finally moved into their new home on October 10, 1976, week five of the season.
Eight years after Giants Stadium opened, it gained a second major tenant. The Jets' lease at Shea Stadium, the home of the New York Mets, had expired at the end of the 1983 season and team owner Leon Hess was having trouble negotiating terms of a new lease to stay in Queens. The city of New York was unwilling to agree to his terms and Hess decided to move the Jets to the Meadowlands permanently (the team previously played a regular season game there in 1977). Their first game in Giants Stadium was on September 6, 1984. With the Jets now playing at the stadium, the grounds crew needed to find a way to set their games apart from Giants games and make them more inviting for their fans and eventually came up with a series of green and white banners and coverings that were hung over the field-level blue walls that circled the stadium and (later) the four entrance gates outside the stadium. The Jets also called the stadium "The Meadowlands" for their games.
The sharing of the stadium by both the Giants and Jets enabled it to break a record that had long been held by Chicago's Wrigley Field. Entering the 2003 season, its 28th, Giants Stadium had played host to 364 NFL games, second only to the 365 played at Wrigley by the Chicago Bears in their 50 seasons there. The Giants' season opening game with the St. Louis Rams tied the record, and the following week the Jets' home opener against the Miami Dolphins broke it.
Giants Stadium was also home to the New York Cosmos, a professional soccer team of the North American Soccer League (1968–84), that attracted record crowds during the late 1970s. The stadium was later home to another soccer team, the New York/New Jersey MetroStars (now the New York Red Bulls) of Major League Soccer, who played there from 1996 to 2009.
Giants Stadium closed following the 2009 NFL season following the construction of MetLife Stadium in the surrounding parking lot. The stadium's final event was the January 3, 2010, game featuring the Jets hosting the Cincinnati Bengals on Sunday Night Football. Demolition of the structure began a month after the game and was completed on August 10, 2010. The New York Giants and New York Jets both moved to MetLife Stadium in 2010.
- ^ a b c d e f "NJSEA Economic Development". New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority. Archived from the original on January 17, 2012. Retrieved May 24, 2012.
- ^ 1634–1699: McCusker, J. J. (1997). How Much Is That in Real Money? A Historical Price Index for Use as a Deflator of Money Values in the Economy of the United States: Addenda et Corrigenda (PDF). American Antiquarian Society. 1700–1799: McCusker, J. J. (1992). How Much Is That in Real Money? A Historical Price Index for Use as a Deflator of Money Values in the Economy of the United States (PDF). American Antiquarian Society. 1800–present: Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis. "Consumer Price Index (estimate) 1800–". Retrieved February 29, 2024.
- ^ "Giants Stadium Seating Chart, Giants Stadium Tickets, Giants Stadium Maps". Gotickets.com. Retrieved February 7, 2010.
- ^ "Giants Stadium Facts". bigbluetailgate.com. Archived from the original on January 16, 2012. Retrieved September 9, 2011.