White Sox Chairman Jerry Reinsdorf smokes a cigar while watching the team warm up before Game 3 of ... [+]
The White Sox are off to a fast start in trying to enact their vision of a new ballpark in a planned development known as The 78, located southeast of the Chicago River.
Two weeks after unveiling renderings prepared with the help of the architecture firm Gensler and stadium architects HOK, team chairman Jerry Reinsdorf traveled to the Illinois capital to begin exploring financing for the project. The team’s lease with the Illinois Sports Facilities Authority on Guaranteed Rate Field expires in 2029.
“We recognize discussions about The 78 serving as the future home of the Chicago White Sox have generated a lot of excitement over the potential of the larger project’s positive economic impact,”the White Sox said in a statement. “We are mindful and respectful of the legislative process and wanted to travel to Springfield to meet personally with legislative leaders. We’re excited to share our vision, and we appreciate their time and hospitality.”
Related Midwest owns the underdeveloped, 62-acre site near the intersection of Roosevelt Road and Clark Street. Its staff accompanied Reinsdorf and White Sox officials on the trip.
“We appreciated the time afforded to us by lawmakers in Springfield,” a Related Midwest spokesman said in a statement issued by the team. “As we shared in the meetings, The 78 is a generational development and an investment in our hometown. It’s personal to us and we are excited about the prospect of delivering the city’s next great neighborhood, while making an historic economic investment that will bring over 10,000 construction jobs and 72,000 permanent jobs to our city and state. The long-term impact will be transformative— creating a new riverfront neighborhood anchored by a state-of-the-art ballpark for generations of fans to enjoy.”
A new White Sox ballpark would anchor a mixed-use development that would include residential and retail properties, with hotels, restaurants and bars on the lower floors of high-rise buildings.
One persistent complaint about Guaranteed Rate Field is that the stadium is oriented toward the southeast, with no views of downtown. The renderings released by Gensler on Feb. 6 show home plate in the southwest corner of the site, with fans looking toward the Chicago skyline. The 78 would include a public plaza fitted with a large video screen, similar to the remodeled Wrigley Field.
The plan pitched to legislators includes Guaranteed Rate Field being remodeled as a home for the MLS’ Chicago Fire Football Club, which has been in search of a permanent home in the city since beginning play in 1998. Some of the 78 acres of parking surrounding the ballpark would be repurposed as a walkable urban grid around new housing.
According to Crain’s Chicago Business, the White Sox are expected to ask for about $1 billion in public financing for the project. “We haven’t asked for anything,” Reinsdorf told reporters on Tuesday. “At an appropriate time, everybody will speak up. Now is not the appropriate time.”
Reinsdorf was successful in lobbying the Illinois legislature for a stadium in 1988. That deal to replace Comiskey Park barely got across the finish line, after the team threatened to move to St. Petersburg, Fla. The Chicago Tribune reports that the city still owes about $50 million on the current Sox stadium, as well as $589 million on a 2002 renovation of Soldier Field.
The Bears have purchased land in suburban Arlington Heights while continued stadium discussions with Chicago and other municipalities. The White Sox have previously expressed their willingness to explore all options, with a relocation to Nashville among the ideas floated.
First-term Chicago mayor Brandon Johnson is an early supporter of the Sox project at The 78. “My conversation with Jerry was very positive,” Johnson told the Chicago Sun-Times after a recent council meeting. “One of the things I did appreciate in our conversation is that what they’re considering, it’s the way new stadiums should and could look. That they have community benefit.”
In the Windy City, Related Midwest is teaming up with Gensler and HOK to relocate the Chicago White Sox from the South Side to the South Loop. The new White Sox stadium is being planned at The 78, a tentative mixed-use megadevelopment backed by Related Midwest. Under the current plan, the Sox’s current home at Guaranteed Rate Field would be repurposed as a soccer stadium. Gensler is responsible for The 78’s master plan, and HOK is the stadium designer.
The 78 would deliver a 62-acre mixed-use neighborhood along the Chicago River just south of Roosevelt Road, as reported by Lee Bey for the Chicago Sun Times. According to Bey, the ballpark would anchor the complex surrounded by a bevy of hotels, restaurants, and bars contained in high-rises.
How the new ballpark will be financed is still up in the air. Illinois Governor J. B. Pritzker has said in the past that he disdains using taxpayer funds for sports stadiums. Related Midwest officials said they’re seeking assistance from the Illinois Sports Facilities Authority (ISFA) to “rearrange existing bonds” for the venture. The announcement comes amid tense negotiations between the Chicago Bears and suburban school districts about relocating Soldiers Field to Arlington.
So far, the White Sox stadium relocation has been supported by Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson and other city officials working closely with the Sox’s owner Jerry Reinsdorf. “My conversation with Jerry was very positive. One of the things I did appreciate in our conversation is that what they’re considering, it’s the way new stadiums should and could look. That they have community benefit,” Mayor Johnson said at a recent council meeting, as reported by Bey.
Renderings by Gensler show a ballpark replete with spectacular views of the Chicago skyline, including the Sears Tower. Gensler designed the stadium’s orientation so that home plate is at the southwest corner of the site, yielding optimal view corridors out into the city. The new stadium would have a slew of high-rise towers as its neighbors. The 78 would also have a new public plaza located just north of the stadium to be fitted with a large video screen facing the terraced park.
Related Midwest and Gensler also showed a potential scheme for repurposing Guaranteed Rate Field and its surrounding sea of parking spaces. Renderings of the team’s “Bridgeport Vision” shows the existing ballpark repurposed as a soccer stadium and a walkable urban grid fitted with housing on top of the parking lots.
Negotiations between Related Midwest and the City of Chicago are ongoing.
White Sox statement: “We recognize discussions about The 78 serving as the future home of the Chicago White Sox have generated a lot of excitement over the potential of the larger project’s positive economic impact. We are mindful and respectful of the legislative process and wanted to travel to Springfield to meet personally with legislative leaders. We’re excited to share our vision, and we appreciate their time and hospitality.”
Related Midwest spokesman: “We appreciated the time afforded to us by lawmakers in Springfield. As we shared in the meetings, The 78 is a generational development and an investment in our hometown. It’s personal to us and we are excited about the prospect of delivering the city’s next great neighborhood, while making an historic economic investment that will bring over 10,000 construction jobs and 72,000 permanent jobs to our city and state. The long-term impact will be transformative— creating a new riverfront neighborhood anchored by a state-of-the-art ballpark for generations of fans to enjoy.”
Imagine leaving your Michigan Avenue hotel, hopping on a water taxi and riding it south on the Chicago River to attend a White Sox game in a new ballpark in the South Loop. That could be possible if the team finds a way to fund a new home on an underdeveloped, 62-acre site near the intersection of Roosevelt Road and Clark Street.
White Sox chairman Jerry Reinsdorf said last summer his team is exploring stadium options beyond its lease at Guaranteed Rate Field, which expires in 2029. He mentioned a search of possibilities in Chicago, the suburbs and even a possible relocation of the team, with Nashville speculated upon as a possibility.
But the Chicago Sun-Times reports the team has identified a prime possibility with the South Loop tract named by its developer as “the 78th,” for its potential to become the city’s 78th neighborhood. The team and new Chicago mayor Brandon Johnson issued a joint statement to confirm their mutual interest in finding a new home for the team.
“We met to discuss the historic partnership between the team and Chicago and the team’s ideas for remaining competitive in Chicago in perpetuity,” they said in a written statement on Wednesday.
While the statement did not confirm specific sites, the Sun-Times’ Fran Spielman, Tim Novak and David Roeder report the South Loop site is of immediate interest.
This collaboration between the city and its American League franchise could be beneficial for both Johnson and the team. The city is faced with likely losing the NFL’s Bears to a site in nearby Arlington Heights, a northwest suburb, while the team has seen its attendance shrink at Guaranteed Rate Field, which opened in 1991 across 35th Street from historic Comiskey Park.
The state of Illinois agreed to build the stadium to kill a deal that would have moved the team to St. Petersburg, Fla. The state’s stadium authority has funded a series of improvements to the park since it opened but is lags far behind the rival Cubs’ Wrigley Field in popularity with fans.
While Wrigley Field is surrounded by restaurants and bars in the middle of Lakeview, Guaranteed Rate Field was built in the shadow of since-demolished public housing. It is surrounded by about 70 acres of parking.
Marc Ganis, a Chicago-based stadium consultant, believes a stadium could work in “the 78.” He said a stadium could be built in a footprint as small as 12-14 acres and that a 3-acre parking structure could hold about 7,000 cars. The site is ideal for mass transit access, reducing the need for parking.
“If the White Sox are to stay in the city proper, that is an excellent location,” Ganis told the Sun-Times. “It’s a clear site that has mass transit and highway access around it. It is one of the very few locations in the urban core of Chicago that could have a well-situated stadium on it.”
Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker has earmarked part of the property for a tech research center associated with the University of Illinois. That project, termed Discovery Partners Institute, would require only about four of the 62 acres, leaving a lot of room for residential and retail use around a potential stadium.
Bill Jackson, executive director of Discovery Partners Institute, told the Sun-Times he knew of the White Sox’s interest and would welcome the team as neighbor.
“A new Sox park could bring the infrastructure we need,” Jackson said. “I think it would be great.”
