The World Cup was supposed to be a Bay Area bonanza. Why does it feel like a flop?

Touch down in Mexico City, one of 16 cities across the U.S., Canada and Mexico hosting the World Cup this month, and you'll enter an airport completely renovated for the event.

A gold replica trophy decorates the concourse. A giant soccer ball hangs from wires on the ceiling. In the men's restroom, people can pee on a tiny soccer ball in the urinal, sending it into a toy goal.

All of this shows that the World Cup is definitely coming to Mexico City in a way that it is not coming to Santa Clara.

In the Bay Area, "nobody I know is talking about the World Cup," said Charles Stone, a former mayor of Belmont who lives within a short drive of Levi's Stadium, where five group stage matches and another in the knockout round are scheduled, beginning Saturday, June 13.

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Local ticket sales are slow, and prices continue to drop in an attempt to stimulate demand. Hotel rooms and short-term rental properties remain vacant along the Peninsula, and a Chronicle review showed plenty of rooms available for roughly $200 a night within walking distance of Levi's. Advertising has been sparse. While crews at San Francisco International Airport will belatedly display banners next week, including an installation that allows travelers to block shots from a robot, the urinals lack any special adornments.

"Maybe the messages are not getting through," Stone ventured. "I've watched soccer in the past and gotten excited. I have no plans around this event at all."

Alexander James of Berkeley found this out the hard way. He bought eight tickets, at $220 apiece, when the lottery opened last September. At the time it seemed like a reasonable price to sit in the bleachers at Levi's Stadium and witness the pageantry of the world's most popular sport: the drums, the olé chants, the macho players falling all over to embrace each other after they score a goal.

But as the games approached, James sought to offload half his haul - four tickets for Jordan vs. Austria on June 16 - to literally any taker. Eventually he sold two to a friend at a deep discount and kept the others. He and his son will accompany the friend to the match.

"I thought for sure there would be more interest," James said with resignation. "I was willing to take the loss."

Maybe it's the matchups. Fans had to buy their tickets on spec before FIFA, which organizes the tournament, announced the schedule in December, and many lament that the Bay Area got screwed. The particular game that James was hawking did not feature a top-seeded team. As of April the squads from Austria and Jordan were ranked 23rd and 63rd in the world, respectively.

Then there are the teams the Bay Area was assigned to host: Australia, setting up at the Oakland Roots and Soul Sports Club in Alameda, and Paraguay, at San Jose State University's Spartan Soccer Complex. But neither is a major draw. Australia, which plays one match in the Bay Area, is ranked 27th, and Paraguay, which has two, is ranked 40th.

The U.S. team, which won't compete in the Bay Area unless it advances, is ranked 15th, and its relative struggles haven't inspired enthusiasm for the sport in the U.S.

Compared with the Super Bowl in February, which according to event organizers delivered $720 million in economic activity, the World Cup has enjoyed virtually no buildup. Most Americans don't know the elite teams or their star players. Much of the online chatter has focused on federal immigration policies that hinder international travel, exacerbated by fears that Immigration and Customs Enforcement will patrol the venues.

Other U.S. host cities are also struggling: Seattle's tourism bureau lowered its projections for the tournament's economic impact after hoteliers reported sluggish bookings. Los Angeles, a much bigger market, has yet to sell out the U.S. vs. Paraguay match on Friday, June 12.

"This is starting to feel like a joyless World Cup," said Jules Boykoff, a former professional soccer player-turned-professor of political science at Pacific University in Oregon. "It's supposed to be the people's game," Boykoff said, but instead, he cited skyrocketing ticket prices and the shadows cast by ICE and FIFA President Gianni Infantino, who in December presented President Donald Trump with what seemed like a sycophantic, newly invented FIFA Peace Prize. The organization is still haunted by a 2015 corruption scandal related to bribery accusations for hosting the 2018 World Cup in Russia and the 2022 cup in Qatar.

Among the biggest local disappointments is the hospitality boom that officials predicted last year. The Bay Area Host Committee, made up of sports executives, retired government workers and former college athletes, estimated that 260,000 out-of-town visitors would flock to World Cup games and celebrations in the Bay Area. In a recent survey commissioned by the American Hotel and Lodging Association, respondents pointed to tepid overseas travel. Nearly 75% of those surveyed from San Francisco told the association their bookings were below what was anticipated.

The host committee didn't have updated visitor projections to share, but expressed optimism. "We are incredibly excited to kick off the World Cup in the Bay Area," host committee President and CEO Zaileen Janmohamed said in a statement to the Chronicle. "This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for local communities to enjoy what will be the largest sporting event in history, and we are ready to welcome the world to our region."

The prospect had excited Rahil Jain, an Airbnb host who rents out three cottages in the South Bay, all within a 15-minute drive of Levi's Stadium. In January, Jain received an email from Airbnb asking whether the company could promote his dwellings in its messaging about the World Cup. He happily agreed. Airbnb had forecast rates of up to $800 a night for properties the size of Jain's, in-law units of about 340 square feet with well-stocked kitchens and dishwashers.

"None of that materialized," he said with a rueful laugh. The months ticked by, and demand was about average for summer. Scrolling through his messages on the Airbnb platform, Jain found two bookings that appeared related to the World Cup. One guest canceled for unknown reasons. The other person professed to be traveling to the South Bay for business and planned to attend a game on the side.

Pricing for Jain's rentals, which is dynamic and based on demand, ultimately fell to $200 to $250 a night, or roughly what he expects if nothing is happening in the Bay Area. He tries to remain optimistic. His own relatives flew in from India for the World Cup; they don't need a hotel room or Airbnb.

"Look, it may be that people are just waiting it out," he said. "The fuel prices are so high. The flights are super expensive. Maybe if the ticket prices go down, that's when they'll bite, and that's when they'll book."

On top of the travel costs are the high admission prices and what some consider dodgy ticketing practices by FIFA. The round-of-32 knockout match on July 1, for example, is too expensive for the average consumer. Premium spots cost more than $10,000, while those in the nosebleed section hover at nearly $600. Complaints of duplicitous seating charts and the sudden appearance of a new "front row" category have triggered investigations of FIFA in New York and New Jersey; California Attorney General Rob Bonta has sent a letter to FIFA officials "raising concerns about reports of potentially misleading ticketing practices."

Ticket buyers told the Chronicle and other outlets that certain choice seats were unavailable, speculating that FIFA had purposefully blocked them off. Representatives of FIFA did not respond to questions from the Chronicle.

What we're left with, Boykoff said, is a World Cup that has strayed far from what Bay Area officials proposed in their 2017 bid to host the games.

"Our vision for hosting the World Cup is to unite Bay Area cities, cultures, and football fans around the world's game to create positive social change throughout our community," politicians and sports honchos wrote in their pitch. "With a spirit of innovation, and embracing the diversity of the region, we aim to inspire a cultural movement around football that leaves a lasting legacy for future generations."

The feel-good language conjured memories of when the U.S. hosted the 1994 World Cup, bringing games to Stanford Stadium and the Rose Bowl in Pasadena. Stanford sports economist Roger Noll attended two matches that year and still waxes nostalgic for the raucous tailgate parties and the spectators chattering in Spanish and Portuguese.

This time around, Noll is skeptical. After all, the World Cup has arrived against the backdrop of an ongoing war with Iran and travel advisories that immigrants are "vulnerable to serious harm" if they come to the U.S.

"You can't go around the world kicking people and then expect that they're going to spend $1,000 a day to come visit you," Noll said.

Cameron Tyer of Pleasant Hill is also starting to regret the $1,800 he spent last September for four tickets to the June 22 game. Three months after he made the purchase, FIFA announced which teams would be playing that night: Algeria and Jordan, considered second- and third-tier in world soccer. Tyer's heart sank.

"We had definitely hoped for something cool, because when is the next time we're going to see a World Cup game?" he said. He still plans to attend the game with his wife, his sister and her boyfriend. "But are we excited for the World Cup? Honestly, I don't know. We haven't really talked about it."

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