Column: Chicago’s love-hate relationship with Soldier Field begins again with a new Bears season

Chicago Bears President Ted Phillips promised a “first-class experience” for fans at the proposed domed stadium in Arlington Heights.

That, of course, would be a significant upgrade from the third-class experience of attending games at Soldier Field, the stadium Chicagoans have had a love-hate relationship with since the Bears made what was called a “temporary” move to the lakefront venue 51 years ago.

We’ve spent most of our lives watching the Bears lose and listening to Bears executives talk about moving to a new home. This year appears to be no different.

Phillips and Chairman George McCaskey spoke at a town meeting Thursday in Arlington Heights about a plan to leave Soldier Field for a bigger, better facility with climate control, parking, nearby restaurants and sports betting facilities, and no doubt a new Bear Raid siren to blast out the neighbors.

It’s the start of a long process, just as it was in 1978 when former Bears President George “Mugs” Halas Jr. threatened to leave Soldier Field because the team’s complaints to the Chicago Park District about the facility fell on “deaf ears.”

“I think it’s time we started taking off the gloves,” Halas told the Tribune’s Don Pierson. “Maybe we’ve been quiet too long.”

The gloves are off again, and this time the Bears mean business.

But with so many logistics yet to be determined, most notably the funding, it will be years before Bears fans can even think of escaping the unfriendly confines of Soldier Field for a new state-of-the-art stadium in Arlington Heights.

Nevertheless, another season of Bears football is upon us, so it’s time to ponder another season of dealing with the inconveniences of going to Soldier Field. It still is hard to get into and out of, the lines are impossibly long and the food choices are about as varied as a high school game.

The aggravation factor tends to be multiplied if the team is bad, and most have pegged the Bears for 10 or more losses in the first year of the Ryan Poles-Matt Eberflus regime. Other than Justin Fields’ preseason, the biggest bright spot has been the installation of Bermuda grass at the behest of Eberflus, who could be in contention for Groundskeeper of the Year if his suggestion works at the stadium with the perpetually plagued sod.

Many forget that the Bears were supposed to leave Soldier Field for a new stadium decades ago. Owner George “Papa Bear” Halas agreed on May 13, 1971, to a three-year lease with the Chicago Park District, with two one-year options.

“The Bears view the move to Soldier Field as purely temporary — an interim measure taken of necessity until a new city stadium can be constructed,” a Tribune report said. “Halas said his target date for a new stadium is three years, but the two successive one-year options were tacked onto the agreement just in case.”

Good idea.

The rest of the story is long and involves several politicians and members of the Halas-McCaskey clan ranging from Papa Bear and Halas Jr. to Michael and George McCaskey.

To make a long story short — they muffed the punt. No new stadium was ever built in the five decades since the original contract, and every stadium proposal has been doomed to failure.

The Bears once considered a move to old Comiskey Park in 1978 while renovations were made at Soldier Field. Nope.

In 1995 team President Michael McCaskey considered a proposal to relocate the team to Gary, Ind., as well as building the “McDome” — a multipurpose facility next to McCormick Place. Not a chance.

Ultimately, the remodeled Soldier Field that opened in 2003 was touted as the equivalent of a modern facility with the same cool architecture inside. But it soon became a punchline for its bizarre design that minimized the classic Greek columns and has a lack of amenities. And naturally, it was still impossible to get in and out.

Soldier Field’s life-span now will be shortened by several years thanks to the Bears’ plan to flee to the suburbs. There are only so many soccer matches, concerts and college football games to schedule in any given year, and once the Bears leave it will exist like a classic old restaurant abandoned during the pandemic.

Mayor Lori Lightfoot has proposed putting a dome over Soldier Field, a last-ditch attempt to persuade the McCaskeys to stick around with yet another facelift. They’ve decided to ignore any remodeling plan, having already made the decision to explore buying the Arlington Heights property. So Soldier Field eventually will become the Chicago version of the Roman Colosseum, only with a faux spaceship crashing into the empty stadium instead of crumbling colonnades.

The panacea of the “first-class” stadium experience is something Phillips and the Bears alluded to during the original remodeling plan more than 20 years ago. We won’t know until an Arlington Heights plan is completed if that’s truly the case.

Is the grass greener in Arlington Heights? Or will the Bears move be the equivalent of replacing the sod at Soldier Field from Kentucky bluegrass to Bermuda?

Planning consultants told a crowd of interested citizens Thursday they plan to have offices, retail, apartments and townhomes, a hotel and a sports betting business near the new, domed stadium.

Well, you can never have enough office buildings in an era when employees are increasingly working remotely, or enough sports betting facilities in an age in which gamblers can use their phones to bet on games from the comfort of their couch.

And Bears Villages or Halas Hollow — or whatever they’ll wind up naming the proposed community — should be fine to live in as long as you’re OK with an air raid siren going off a dozen or so times during home games.

Since it will take years for the Bears to implement their plan, we’ll still be able to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the first football game at Soldier Field during the 2024 season. The new stadium with the classic columns, then called Municipal Grant Park Stadium, played host to a Notre Dame-Northwestern game on Nov. 22, 1924.

Tribune sports writer Wallace Abbey previewed the game by noting that coach Knute Rockne’s Irish, considered the best team in the nation with the legendary “Four Horsemen,” would have their hands full because of the poor field conditions.

“It is probable that in the mud which will greet the team today Notre Dame will be at a slight disadvantage,” he wrote.

The Irish squeaked out a 12-6 win before a crowd of more than 35,000.

The game of football has changed quite a bit over the last 98 years, and Soldier Field has undergone many facelifts since that first game.

But at least we have new sod for the old place.

Better days are ahead.