Screen Shot 2013-06-17 at 11.07.16 AMBeer-stained floors. A noticeable lack of nuance. Crazy, perhaps dangerous, stunts. Dark deeds in dark corners. Years of mediocrity punctuated by only one legitimate victory and a binger with a guy named “Nails.” 

And now there’s another thing that my college experience has in common with The Vet: it hasn’t been completely paid for yet.

Great report from Philly Mag yesterday that the city of Philadelphia is still paying for Veterans Stadium:

Nearly 50 years after the initial $25 million bond was approved in 1964, the city is still paying for the construction of a stadium that no longer even exists, making Veterans Stadium one of two of the oldest debts on the books, according to available bond data and interviews with the Controller’s Office. The other debt, also wrapped in the same $162 million loan authorized on the 1964 ballot, is the SEPTA expansion of the El to the Northeast and the Broad Street Line to Pattison—constructed to service the Vet.

The remaining balance on the Vet has been paid down to $183,000, and the city still owes more than $1 million on the subway expansion. Both projects were financed with 30-year bonds, putting them about 20 years behind repayment schedule, but have been refinanced multiple times, most recently in 2012, allowing the city to defer payment. Bond data indicate that the Vet will finally be paid off sometime in 2014, and the subway not until at least 2022.

Oh.

As pointed out in the article, this isn’t entirely rare. It – of course – happened in Pittsburgh, with Three Rivers Stadium. But there’s something strange about taxpayers paying for a building that is now a parking lot for a building that is also paid for by taxpayers. It’s kind of like in Monopoly when you sell a property for a loss and then and have to pay rent on it every trip around the board. But instead of it being a luxurious plastic hotel… it’s a parking lot that your (my) ex-girlfriend used to think it was OK to pee in. From Philly, With Love.