Boy, is this funny or what?????

Sep 19, 2018, 2:54 PM

Coots announce plans to renovate W-B after 2019 season via The State.

They have had Cocky II waiting to go up for 2 years and still don't have the $1M to do that.

AND..The Columbarium , oh, the Columbarium...Dec. 10, 2017

COLUMBIA — The proposed memorial gardens where University of South Carolina fans can place their cremated remains in the shadow of Williams-Brice Stadium is expected to move in an effort to help ease concerns over having what amounts to a cemetery in the middle of the Gamecocks’ prized tailgating park, The Post and Courier has learned.

Developers of what’s known formally as a columbarium have been negotiating with the school’s foundation and have settled tentatively on a spot on a side street bordering the tailgating area not far from Bluff Road, the main thoroughfare next to the stadium where the current memorial site is located.

“We have worked very hard and very patiently to work out something that is appropriate,” columbarium developer Whit Suber said. “We will not impede on the fun taking place. It’s not a morbid place. It’s going to be a celebration of life and a celebration of the Gamecocks. This is not about candles and crying."

"We do enough crying across the street (at Williams-Brice).”

USC’s leaders, who have failed to stop the project so far, still disapprove of a burial site next to its tailgating zone called Gamecock Park.

“We remain opposed to the idea of a columbarium inside of Gamecock Park and believe that is an inappropriate use for this tiny parcel of land,” university spokesman Wes Hickman said in a statement.

Suber said he could start construction at any time on the 1,900-square-foot site along Bluff Road that he and his partners bought for $820,000 if he can’t work out a swap with the school.

“We’re building this no matter what,” Suber said.

He said he is willing to wait to ease concerns of university officials who started negotiations after they failed to halt the columbarium last year when the project went before a Columbia zoning board.

Suber said the Cockabooses — train cars near the stadium used for parties — were not met with universal support when they debuted in 1990, but now they are gameday icons at USC.

At the proposed new site, Suber said he plans on building three 8-foot-tall monuments holding 2,400 spaces, or niches, for funeral urns and will be in the shape of the letters U-S-C. The black marble letters will have lighting on top. Niches will cost between $5,000 and $10,000.

Any deal to swap spaces will not be finalized until next year at the earliest, said Russ Meekins, USC’s foundation chief who is leading negotiations for the school. Any agreement would need approval by the USC board.

Suber hopes to open the columbarium before the next season kicks off. The Columbia real estate broker insists he will not perform any construction during the season if work is delayed.

A move helps both sides, Meekins said. The current location on Bluff Road provides no place for parking for the columbarium and sits essentially on the front porch of USC’s showcase fan area.

“It’s awkward where it is right now,” Meekins said. “It’s not a good place for (Suber), and it’s not a good place for the university.”

Still, just like university leaders, some USC devotees are a bit uneasy with a resting place for the dead so close to the home of their beloved Gamecocks.

“College football has a ton of kitschy traditions in general, and this may turn out to be one 20 years from now,” a fan posted on a Gamecock message board when the project was first announced last year. “But right now it just sounds creepy.”

Other USC supporters are just plain upset.

“It blows my mind that our university is allowing for something like this to happen,” a fan posted on a message board this year. “So I get to pay $500 a year for a spot in Gamecock Park and I have to look at a columbarium while tailgating? This guy should have been bought out the day that he proposed this idea.”

That’s not so simple. Previous longtime owners would not sell to USC when the university purchased the old State Farmers Market in 2009. And it’s become rather expensive. Suber’s group bought the sliver of land that’s less than half the size of a football end zone for 328 times more than its taxable value of $2,500.

Suber is trying to be a good Gamecock neighbor in the hopes of winning over skeptics.

Once built, the columbarium would be surrounded by brick walls to separate it from the tailgating area.

“We are including a host of advanced security features to prevent Clemson fans from visiting,” he added, referring to occasional spray-paint vandalism by Tiger fans around the stadium.

While acknowledging the columbarium will be lucrative, Suber plans on using proceeds from niche sales to fund scholarships for children of USC alumni stricken by cancer and buy land to expand the practice course for USC’s golf teams.

USC is just the first of memorials that Suber plans to build near college stadiums. He said he’s looking at locations at other major Southern universities, banking on the lifelong loyalty fans have for their alma maters.

“It’s about the experience, this is where people spent the most formative years of their lives,” he said. “It’s where you met your wife and where you met some of your best friends. College has replaced the concept of hometown.”

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Boy, is this funny or what?????

Re: Boy, is this funny or what?????

good lowerd!***

well, we have a real graveyard about 50 feet from the gate

Yes, it was there long before the stadium was built.......

Re: Boy, is this funny or what?????

Re: Boy, is this funny or what?????

I do agree with the very last paragraph where it says.......

It sure must suck to be you...

Did you read my message at all?????.........

Re: Did you read my message at all?????.........

Re: Boy, is this funny or what?????

On second thought, maybe the columbariam is appropriate...

I bet it'll scare the cr*p out of Muschamp!

Re: And the security!!

Remarkable and funny

TigerBoard POTD