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August 21, 2009
Rays stadium committee: We wanna Rays stadium!
The A Baseball Community coalition of business leaders studying a new Tampa Bay Rays stadium issued another report yesterday, and concluded that the Rays need a new stadium, and need someone else to pay for it. "Constructing a new stadium is required. It's no longer a question of if, but when," insists the draft report, adding that it should have a retractable roof, that it shouldn't be in downtown St. Petersburg unless it gets "iconic" surroundings, and that the public should pay for most of it.
An expected addendum to be released today will indicate that the Rays want a pony, and are prepared to hold their breath until they get one.
I was reading the local coverage and ran into an item claiming that one of the St. Petersburg candidates for mayor had some great idea to modify and continue to use Tropicana field http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jAQIXydFhgc
Actually not such a good idea -- he wants to power a retractible roof using solar power which is impractical and costly.
The folks advocating a new stadium claim that a retrofit of Tropicana would cost as much as a new stadium -- not their money of course.
Posted by Ed on August 21, 2009 02:33 PM
The big expense (and carbon footprint, for that matter) for a retractable roof isn't powering it, anyway - it's building it. He gets brownie points for using the "green" buzzword, though.
Posted by Neil on August 21, 2009 03:44 PM