San Diego Chargers Reject New Stadium Plans

The San Diego Chargers rejected plans by a developer to build a $1 billion stadium as a part of the redevelopment project to the land surrounding Qualcomm Stadium, stating that the project would be too big for the Mountain Valley site.

According to the Associated Press on Thursday, hours before the project was to be publicly announced, attorney Mark Fabiani sent developer Perry Dealy a letter stating that the team does not believe it has a realistic chance of happening and to stop referring to the Chargers in reference to the project.

"We did it reluctantly," Fabiani told the Associated Press of the Charger Club's decision to back out of the plan.

The plan, named the The River Park at Mission Valley would include a 70,000 seat stadium, 3.76 million square feet of office space in 11 buildings, a 16-story hotel, 6,000 residential spaces, 500,000 square feet of retail space, and more than 14,000 parking spaces according to the Associated Press.

The San Diego Chargers still hope to build a new stadium, with areas such as Chula Vista and downtown San Diego, east of PetCo Park—home of the San Diego Padres—under review.

The hopes to build a stadium in Chula Vista were put on hold after the uncertainty of the shutdown date of a local power plant in the area.

Dealy is disappointed with the club's decision to back out of the project, but understands that the project has many issues that still need to be resolved.

Under Dealy's plan the Chargers and the NFL would each contribute $200 million to the project while San Diego State would contribute $100 million. The rest would be paid for with taxes and sales on the surrounding developments.