NFL owners agreed to award the 2013 game to New Orleans on May 20th, the first time the Super Bowl will be held in the city since Hurricane Katrina shredded parts of the Louisiana Superdome, home to the Saints. It will be New Orleans’ 10th time as a Super Bowl site.
“We’re just thrilled about what’s going on,” Saints owner Tom Benson said. “We’re getting a new Superdome. Now we’re going to get a Super Bowl on top of that. It couldn’t be any more exciting than that.” Benson was congratulated by the owners, even those who saw Super Bowl bids for their city be voted down.
Louisiana lawmakers already have approved plans to spend $85 million in Superdome upgrades, which would be completed in time for the 2013 Super Bowl. The upgrades would include additional seating, new suites, wider concourses and other measures for the Saints to generate new revenue streams.
The Saints needed to leave their home city, then returned to great fanfare in September 2006 — a night many in New Orleans point to as perhaps the most poignant sign that normalcy was slowly returning.
“(That) had an emotional impact on this city that carried the hearts of New Orleanians for the next two years,” said J. Stephen Perry, the president of the New Orleans metropolitan convention and visitors bureau. “And this announcement today, I will tell you, will have jubilation in the streets.”
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