Tucson Arena

Seats are a joke, I’m 5’4 140# and I had to wedge my average butt into the seat, and turn sideways so my knees weren’t in the back of the seat in front. I’m never going back.

They have since replaced the seats on the upper level – for the first time in over 30 years. Unfortunately, they tried to stuff as many seats as possible in every row, so expect the smallest seat humanly possible. The immovable arms/​drink holders will jam into your hips as you sit down and never let up. Your knees will be jammed into the head of the person in front of you, so hopefully you’ll end up going to an event where you’ll be standing most of the time.

It was good!

Attended the Mineral show at this Arena. The show is amazing. It is an annual show that takes over Tucson for the month of February. Amazing specimens of minerals collected from all over the world. Many international guests with the mineral or rockhound bug attend the show. In addition there are many in the gem trade. If you are a fan of chemistry or simply enjoy beautiful rocks and minerals you will be absolutely blown away by this show. The Tucson Arena is the heart of the show — thousands of vendors inside and out in surrounding tent cities.

Being new to Tucson we had no idea what to expect. We just saw the Dralion: Cirque du Soleil show here and it was fantastic.
Sure this place isn’t the newest, but we really like it because it’s small it’s so much less dramatic than a bigger city/​venue. Our seats were great, the place wasn’t even half full which I thought was sad, but it makes it nice not too many people and no lines.
We can’t wait to go back.

I was here recently with my nephews for a WWE event. I got the chance to woop it up and cheer under the guise of «just taking my nephews» to the event. The seating was great but the walk to the parking lot was a bit confusing. My wife and I were also here recently for another home show. There were a lot of different vendors which was nice and they had the most amazing tri-​tip outside. They even sold you a 25lb chunk of tender seasoned tri-​tip to take home. It was awesome. The TCC security they had working the event were somewhat rude. They talked to us like we were a nuisance.

The TCC is very modern: if this were 1970. In fact, considering the size of Tucson, I would say whatever exterior revamping they did almost brought this place into the 80s! The TCC is an arena to hold events, but it doesn’t make it the ideal arena by any means. Old and outdated, ugly, the TCC simply needs to be re-​built and given a more modern snazzy look with better aisles, and steps that aren’t so horrible small or steep (felt like I could take a tumble down at any second just finding my seat).
To be fair, the TCC is a victim of the inept Tucson Rio Nuevo revitalization and its updates have been slow to non-​existent. I have gone to quite a handful of events here and it has been just adequate, with an antique sound system and worn interior. Thankfully the quality of the events coming here make the TCC a viable place to visit. Parking and leaving can be insane, but that’s any convention center in my experience. But really TCC… $ 8 to park? When parking costs more than the price of a ticket for one of your shows, there is an issue.

I cannot rate this place higher than 1 star until more than 1 stall in the ladies restroom has a working lock.
Fix it. It’s not expensive.

This place sucked. Really. We went there this past Saturday so I could see Death Cab for Cutie (for my 3^rd time – first two were at Mesa Ampitheatre, which is fabulous)…
there was tons of traffic, and we couldn’t figure out why, since the doors had opened about an hour and a half before we got there… and then, once we got into the Convention Center, we figured out why – the TCC is divided into different halls. the first arena-​area we came to had a hockey game about to begin… so we had to walk alllll the way around the building to find the ‘exhibition hall’ where the concert was being held.
so…we head in, and it’s a GIANT GYMNASIUM with NO acoustics whatsoever! it was especially mind-​numbing during the opening band (Cold War Kids?), because they sucked to begin with, and when you added the sound of their crap bouncing off the back (cinderblock) wall, it was just torture.
on top of everything, if you wanted a drink or two, you had to stand in a series of (½ hour long – literally) lines, and then stay behind a barrier of folding tables (about 300 ft from the stage) until your drink was downed.
total BS.

Wow. You are really big. Who knew Tucson had so many conventions?
I don’t really have much to write on a review for a convention center except that you lose a star because your water vending machines only took $ 1 bills and I had to return after walking all the way upstairs with a $ 5 bill and being foiled. That was a little annoying.