Let the hyperbole and skepticism abound, Tampa Bay Rays fans. You've been waiting for a new ballpark since pretty much Day 1 of your team's existence, and it appears the wait is almost over. After decades of failed stadium efforts on multiple sites in multiple cities, and after many cockamamie schemes and threats to move the team, it appears that the Tampa Bay Rays will finally be getting a new home in downtown St. Petersburg. In the past couple of weeks, the St. Petersburg City Council and the Pinellas County Commission both formally approved their shares of public subsidy for the estimated $1.3B ballpark, which will be one part of an overall $6.5B development of what is known locally as the Gas Plant District. The ballpark and district will be sited next to and surrounding Tropicana Field, which is the current home of the Rays that will eventually be torn down. Groundbreaking is expected in January 2025 with an anticipated completion in time for Opening Day 2028. These dates coincide with the Rays' original 30-year lease on the Trop expiring after the 2027 season.
- St. Petersburg is contributing $429.5M to the total project, in the form of tax-exempt bonds that will be repaid through a TIF. $287.5M of that money goes towards the ballpark, $12M for an on-site wastewater treatment facility, and the remainder towards infrastructure improvements for the overall district. St. Petersburg is also selling 65 acres of public land to the Rays for this development for $105M.
- Pinellas County is contributing $312.5M to the total project, which will come from an existing hotel bed tax. Only 40% of that tax is allowed by law to go towards stadium funding, so there will also be some debt incurred by the county to cover the gap.
- The Rays are contributing over $700M towards the ballpark, plus any cost overruns, as well as the development of the remainder of the site through debt, private equity, and outside investors.
- The Rays will have a 30-year lease with two 5-year optional extensions on the new ballpark, including a non-relocation agreement
- Ballpark will be the most intimate in the majors, with only 25,000-30,000 planned fixed seats on primarily 2 levels, and a capacity of around 34,000 for baseball games when factoring in social spaces and standing room areas, as well as a very minimal amount of foul territory. It will feature a tiered pavilion-style fixed roof and artificial turf.
- Gas Plant District is planned to eventually include 5,400 residential units, 750 hotel rooms, 1.4M square feet of Class A office and medical space, 750K square feet of retail, a separate 4,000-seat concert venue, and 14 acres of green space. A new African-American Museum will also be built - this site was an historically majority-black area of the city that was infamously displaced by the Trop in the 1980s. It is unclear how much if any of the surrounding development will be built by the time the ballpark opens - hopefully it is closer to the Atlanta situation than DC.
Aside from the cash grab by a billionaire owner which I've repeated ad nauseum, the two most interesting parts of this ballpark to me are the roof and the site. I cringed when I saw the renderings that depict the all-too-familiar low slung roof on trusses suspended over the field, as I immediately thought of all the troubles that Tropicana Field is notorious for with batted ball interference. Many covered stadiums have successfully worked through this issue with extensive studies, but the roof just looks so short in the renderings that I really hope that some people smarter than me are not wasting all this effort just to recreate the same problem. I also find it interesting that after years of trying to get out of downtown St. Petersburg because of the well-documented issues the site has with access from across the bay, that the Rays are just going all-in on building on the exact same site they are now. It just goes to show that money cures all ills, and teams will follow anyone who is willing to cough it up.
It feels like I've been following the new Rays stadium process since this blog started over 17 years go, so in a way the end to this saga feels kind of anti-climatic. I also am not entirely going to believe this is happening until I see pictures of shovels in the ground, but it sure seems to have a more solid foundation that the A's dumpster fire situation. 2028 has the potential to be just the beginning of a very exciting era of new major league ballparks, and Erik and I are ready for it.
touch with baseball when his childhood heroes Robin Yount, Paul Molitor, and Jim Gantner retired but the Great Home Run Chase of 1998 reignited his passion. As a student at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Erik became involved with the campus chapter of Habitat for Humanity. With this group Erik traveled to Portland, OR and Baltimore, MD to work on construction projects and help the group raise $25,000 to partially sponsor a house in Milwaukee. Also at UWM, Erik met Peter Nagel. The two attended their first Brewers game together during Opening Weekend 2003. Despite their failure to ignite the coals at their first tailgate, the two had a blast and were soon making weekly trips to the ballpark. Erik has gone on to several colleges and changed careers several times, and has moved all the way out to New Hampshire, but has always stayed true to his baseball roots by holding part-time stadium usher jobs. To this day he looks back fondly on his incredible cross-country journey.
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