Frigid temperatures and an on-going bus strike can’t stop Super Bowl fever.
Mayor Michael Bloomberg announced yesterday plans for Super Bowl XLVIII — slated for February 2, 2014 — including a slew of festivities in the week leading up to the big game.
Despite hosting the Super Bowl at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey, the city is expected to see a boost in tourism from the thousands of fans and media that come for the football championship.
Broadway will be renamed “Super Bowl Boulevard” for the festivities, as many of the week-long celebrations will be hosted in Manhattan. The epicenter with the celebrations will include nightly concerts, the Vince Lombardi Trophy display and, among other things, past and present football greats.
“New York City is already the nation’s Super Bowl champion of tourism destination and next year around this time hundreds of thousands of fans from across the country and around the globe will converge on our region to see the NFL’s best,” said Bloomberg at a press conference — flanked by NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell. “All these activities are going to show our city’s best face to people from around the world and will make being in New York for the Super Bowl truly memorable,” he continued.
“For the New York/New Jersey Super Bowl, we’ve embraced the opportunity to create plans that are as big, bold and unique as New York City and the surrounding region itself. While we can only fit 80,000 fans into MetLife Stadium for the game in East Rutherford, New Jersey, we look forward to hosting hundreds of thousands of people at different attractions and events during Super Bowl Week, throughout all parts of the area,” said Goodell.
Bloomberg has promised next year’s match up will be a hometown rivalry between the stadium’s two tenants: the New York Giants and the New York Jets. Both teams, however, failed to make the playoffs this season.
But that potential is alongside several firsts for the championship:
“Super Bowl Boulevard and the events of Super Bowl Week will complement our growing legacy,” said Jets owner Woody Johnson. “Which includes being the first game hosted by two NFL franchises and by two states, the first in the Northeast, and the first in an open-air venue in a cold-weather city.”
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