No, the stadium creates the blight.
In Detroit, the deadest downtown blocks those containing Comerica and Ford Field. That isn't a coincidence, and that's why sports arenas are usually put away from intact neighborhoods, because they are so damaging to the streetscape.
The massive parking needs, the huge, monotonous, anti-pedestrian streetfronts, and the fact the blocks are dead 95% of the time pretty much guarantees a moribund neighborhood. Comerica tore down prewar highrises for a parking field.
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