Warren Newson wrote:
Curious Hair wrote:
BD wrote:
On another note, why do the White Sox need a new stadium? I get the park isn't great because it doesn't show the city in the backdrop, etc. but I've never had an issue going or watching there.
They don't. It does everything you need a baseball stadium to do. Getting there couldn't be easier, ingress and egress are fine, and the bad seats have all been renovated out. It's functionally a 20-year-old stadium.
Everyone has fallen in love with what the Atlanta Braves did by moving out to the suburbs and building a strip mall around a publicly financed stadium. It's never Wrigleyville or Yawkey Way that they cite, it's always the Braves and their simulacrum of a neighborhood, with places called "Good Times Social" or "The Spot: an American Bar and Grill." Of course, the White Sox could have all that in their current location simply by converting some of their oceans of parking lots into such buildings. They know this because they're doing that exact same thing for the Bulls right now. But if they can get public money to do it all from scratch in a marginally better location, why not?
I don't think there's a problem with not being able to see the skyline from the grandstand. You can't see the skyline from the Wrigley grandstand either. You see it as you cross the Dan Ryan coming off the Red Line. Then you see it again as you're going to your seats. The ramps have little instagram landings where you can stand and get your picture taken with the skyline behind you. You get a good look at everything, say "that's cool," then go to your seat and watch the game.
We had probably about half the league try to build stadiums in cool urban areas or attempt to create cool urban areas around new stadiums. It would be interesting if we're actually returning to the mall park era. Especially since Comiskey was essentially the last mall park, until they built those stadiums for the Braves and Rangers.
Do you mean the first pair of Braves and Rangers stadiums directly after Comiskey, or the new ones from a few years ago? lol. I can't believe Turner Field only lasted 20 years. The new park has already had 40% of Turner Field's lifespan.
Anyway, I don't think we're going to see any mass return to suburban-style baseball stadiums, no. The Rangers are a special case because they've been 30 miles out of Dallas since the day they got there and for whatever reason they think that's cool and good. They think paradise
is the parking lot. But I don't think there's anyone else who can move toward that. The Royals want to replace Kauffman Stadium (which New Comiskey is a copy of) with yet another Hip Urban Ballpark downtown, and I don't know how far into the future the Brewers are looking, but you've gotta believe they're angling to get downtown, too.
I'd love to see some of the parking lots redeveloped. There's just
so much parking that isn't necessary when you have three train stations a block or two away (and could have a fourth for the Southwest if you got creative). But that was the idea of the park when it was designed for the suburbs: get 'em on parking fees, get 'em on concessions, and send 'em home. Then they plopped it into an urban environment that sucks ass to drive to. Is it the most perfect location in Chicago? Probably not. But it's where the White Sox have played for over a century and it can be made to work.
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Molly Lambert wrote:
The future holds the possibility to be great or terrible, and since it has not yet occurred it remains simultaneously both.