More proof that retro stadiums are cookie cutters

[griffin128]

Those Dolphin Stadium photos certainly show a sad, forlon looking place.  True, it's not the least bit charming.  But go back and look at those photos and imagine every seat filled with a human.  Then it would look like a happening, cool place to be.

I mean, there's nothing wrong with a plain looking, utilitarian ballpark that a sellout can't fix.  Maybe Florida just isn't a fit for Major League Baseball.

sadly, this isn't true. I was there for the playoffs in 2003. I am a Cubs fan, and I had just gotten back from Atlanta, where the place was rocking for game 5, as half of the 50,000+ were Cubs fans. I went down to Pro Player, and the place is as bland as could be, even with 65,000 there. Florida isn't fit for a major league team.

The sellout never fixed the plain, utilitarian ballpark, even during the playoffs.

This doesn't make sense, they had 65,000 people there and yet they don't deserve a major league team because the stadium is bland?

I think he meant that the crowd just wasn't as energetic as the one in Atlanta was. Think about that. Less energetic than a Braves game.

wow, this thread has spiraled down to even criticizing the Marlins fans for not cheering enough WHEN they do show up pf course.

[brooksdiamond]

I found this website, www.ballparkreviews.com

It ranks major and minor league baseball parks. It includes many of the past and present

major and minor league parks. It grades them A+ to F. I may have missed something on

it, but I think the only park that recieves an A+ is Engle Stadium in Chattanooga, TN. The

team there, the Lookouts play in a new park now. But Engle stadium still stands. I think it's

a historical landmark.

Next to Wrigley field and Fenway Park it's the oldest stadium around, I think.

Get a load of some of the dumps used in the minor leagues. They have pics of the stadiums.

[NYCdog]

Hell, you could call the Green Monster a gimmick, or the vines at Wrigley a gimmick.

Really? Unlike the totally arbitrary angles in the wall in parks like MMP and CBP, Fenway Park was shoehorned into an existing neighborhood block already bounded by roads. To make playing baseball there even remotely fair, the Green Monster was built. It's the opposite of gimmicky - it was done out of necessity in an attempt to give the park major-league legitimacy (and possibly to protect the buildings across the street).

This is where an explaination for MMP's short fences comes into play. Most people who havent been to the ballpark dont know its layout and its boundaries actually causes the creation of a short fence.....a la this quoted explaintion abouyt Fenway and the Green Monster.

These two photos above best illustrate what architects H.O.K. Sport had to deal with.

Due to Union Station's position on the site, the ballpark was unable to expand out all the way to the streetscape, thus giving it more room for deeper outfields. There simply would be no way to fit the roof into the ballparks plan's. The roof would literally crash into Union Station. So in light of that, the ballpark had to be placed behind Union Station, leaving no room at all for seats in left, hence the reason why there are only 200 in the Crawford Boxes. Thus the "Arched Wall" wall was born, creating the most inviting power alley in baseball.

In essence, site boundaries are the reason for Minute Maid's ridiculously short fences.....just like Fenway. But if the ballpark had NO ROOF, there would be no excuse for it at all.

When MMP debuted in 2000, It was the depth of the power alley, not the Crawford Boxes, that spawned "Ten-run Field." The power alley to left was only 363 feet with a 9 foot fence, and saw more homers hit that direction then the Crawford Boxes have ever seen in its six year run. Virtually every ball hit that direction was a homer. So a solution was formulated. The Left Field power alley fence was raised from 9 to 30 feet in height....or having to hit the ball over the overhanging porches in left-center. This dramatically reduced number of home runs hit in MMP, thus making it the average hitter park it is today, compared to the homer heaven it was in 2000.

And for the record......I have been to ALL of the new ballparks now. Minute Maid is the most underrated ballpark in baseball. Easily Top 5. I'd place it #3 behind PNC and....drumroll please.

Shark will love this....AT&T Park, hands down the best sporting venue in the world! That site and Peter Magowan is a god-send for the Giants franchise.....or else they would be in Tampa playing at the fore-mentioned Trop. Furthermore, that Dome would have holes in it due to all of Barry's shots.

Damn, I finally contributed something to SL.net.....I guess being an architect was a good career decision after all.

[Mings]

Damn, I finally contributed something to SL.net.....I guess being an architect was a good career decision after all.

Well yeah.

That and now I know I have a contact when I look to start doing my internship.

[NYCdog]

BTW, this thread is correct....... Retro is now cookie-cutter.

Everyone else just tries to throw in there own lil unique charm into the equation but it all ends up being the same.....retro.

This is why the lastest ballpark designs out of DC, Miami, and Minnesota are more modern designs.....because they are trying to seperate themsleves from the rest of the crowd.

You can thank Montreal for this.....they first debuted the idea of a modern ballpark design when the debuted the design for the ill-fated Labatt Park project in 2001

[FUNKAFIED]

I don't care if it monsoons in St. Petersburg every day, it's gotta be better than being in there.

FWIW, every article I read on the city says it's one of the sunniest in America. Why would there be so many old people retiring there if it's always cloudy and rainy, anyway?

Youve obviously never been to St. Pete in mid July. The humidity is HORRIBLE. The dome makes perfect sense. And accually, the trop isnt that bad of a stadium.

And thats another reason why i pray that Washington DC builds a retractable roof stadium. The only place ive been more miserable due to heat and humidity 24 hours a day was New Orleans.

I flew down to Tampa 2 weeks ago for a vacation and a couple games of the Red Sox/Rays series. It was my first time there and I thought it might suck watching a game in a dome again. I went to Olympic in Montreal in 2002 and it was horrible.

In St. Pete, it was 87 and humid outside and in the Trop it's 72 and comfortable. The roof is high enough and semi-translucent so it doesn't feel so closed-in like Olympic or even Rogers Centre (roof closed).

Tropicana Field isn't really a bad place to see a game. The seats are comfortable and the concourses are huge so it's easy to get around for concessions and whatnot. I think it would be better with a retractable roof option, but it's fairly pleasant. It's also the only MLB stadium I've gone to that I didn't have to pay for parking. It's free.

My home park is Fenway Park. I visit several times a season and will always love it, cramped seats and all. I hope they never build a new park. That said, the new "retro" parks are gorgeous. I like Camden Yards a lot and really want to see PNC and Busch III.

I don't really care if they resemble each other. Anything's better than those god-awful multipurpose stadiums of the early 1970's.

[VitaminD]

Due to Union Station's position on the site, the ballpark was unable to expand out all the way to the streetscape, thus giving it more room for deeper outfields. There simply would be no way to fit the roof into the ballparks plan's. The roof would literally crash into Union Station. So in light of that, the ballpark had to be placed behind Union Station, leaving no room at all for seats in left, hence the reason why there are only 200 in the Crawford Boxes. Thus the "Arched Wall" wall was born, creating the most inviting power alley in baseball.

In essence, site boundaries are the reason for Minute Maid's ridiculously short fences.....just like Fenway. But if the ballpark had NO ROOF, there would be no excuse for it at all.

Those are great pictures, and is does shed some light on Houston's spatial issues. However, the Crawford boxes take a bad situation and make a cheap HR even cheaper. If you're going to make the comparison to Fenway (which is valid), keep in mind that the Green Monster was built without seating in front of it, and when the Red Sox tried to expand seating capacity, they added seats on top of the Monster, not in front of it. The Astros obviously couldn't do that with the roof apparatus and railroad track, but that doesn't mean they had to add the Crawford boxes - at all. For 200 extra seats, they could've put them somewhere else in the park, or just gone with 200 fewer seats overall. And none of that explains the other contrivances, like the hill and the flagpole.

Interesting find on the Labatt Park project... from the CF view, it looks a little bit like a modernized Dodger Stadium (without the 4th deck behind the plate and with a 2nd deck in the outfield).

[TraciLords]

what does "cookie cutter" mean?

[brinkeguthrie]

what does "cookie cutter" mean?

all the designs look the same. like when you take cookie dough, roll it out, then take the cutter and stamp out all christmas trees like when you make christmas cookies.

and the earlier post is right.

AT&T Park validates the #1 rule in real estate:

location, location, location.

[TraciLords]

cheers!

[HurricaneDavid]

By all accounts so far, about a dozen balls that would have gone out last year hit the new & improved LF wall.

What are your sources on this? I've watched about 75% of the Astros games this year, and I don't remember a single ball hitting off the top 3 feet of the LF wall, let alone a dozen.

[HurricaneDavid]

what does "cookie cutter" mean?

all the designs look the same. like when you take cookie dough, roll it out, then take the cutter and stamp out all christmas trees like when you make christmas cookies.

Furthermore, the term "cookie cutter" is CLEARLY the wrong term for the stadiums of the 90s and beyond. The cookie cutter stadiums of the 70s (Veterans, Three Rivers, Riverfront) were all just about the same stadium. The stadiums of the 90s each have their own unique elements. Anyone who refers to them as cookie cutters is just proving that they have absolutely NO understanding of what that term means.

[See Red]

These new 'retro' parks are cookie cutter to an extent, but as mentioned earlier, what makes them unique is how a lot of them use what's around them. PNC Park gives fans an incredible view of Pittsburgh. Is there any stadium in the league that offers a more breathtaking view than the sun setting over the Rocky Mountains if you sit down the first base line at a Rockies game? Besides, sometimes these parks just fit. For instance, if you drive or walk around downtown Denver and look at all the buildings, the brick and green steel of Coors Field fits perfectly with the rest of the LoDo (Lower Downtown) area.

[VandyDelphia Mike]

By all accounts so far, about a dozen balls that would have gone out last year hit the new & improved LF wall.

What are your sources on this? I've watched about 75% of the Astros games this year, and I don't remember a single ball hitting off the top 3 feet of the LF wall, let alone a dozen.

He's referring to Citizens' Bank Park, not Minute Maid. The Phillies broadcasters have been keeping an unofficial running tally of balls that would have been home runs in the 2005 CBP that wound up being non-homers in '06.

[The_Admiral]

Is there any stadium in the league that offers a more breathtaking view than the sun setting over the Rocky Mountains if you sit down the first base line at a Rockies game?

I'm guessing it's not Turner Field, though

[winghaz]

Is there any stadium in the league that offers a more breathtaking view than the sun setting over the Rocky Mountains if you sit down the first base line at a Rockies game?

Coors Field is fantastic for that. You keep wanting to look at the Rocky Mountains so much that it takes you away from the game.

But there are other ballparks that also have gorgeous views. One of my favorites is Dodger Stadium.

But the best view of all may have been in the Skydome when that couple was making whoopie in the hotel room.

[The_Admiral]

I misread his line. I thought he said "Is there any stadium in the league that offers a more breathtaking view of the sun setting over the Rocky Mountains if you sit down the first base line at a Rockies game?"

Anyway, Wrigley and Kauffman have great views beyond the walls. Angel Stadium is too contrived.

[paynomind]

There is SOME truth the the idea that the "brick and steel ball park with a thin row of outfield seats and a view of downtown" keeps happening over and over. Pittsb, St L, Atl, Houston, Detroit ...even San Fran, if you think of their distinguishing view of the city is more the bay than the city buildings.

But the real question is this: Is it a bad thing? I say no.

Admittedly, the view of the water is pretty boring after about the 3rd inning in San Fran. Cargo ships going by at 3mph just aint that cool, and a view of Oakland is second in a beauty race with a grey concrete-block wall.

Atl has some interesting buildings to look at, St louis has the beautiful arch and capitol, but Pittsb, Detroit, and houston dont have particularly great downtown buildings to look at.

But, overall, i like a sport paying honor to its past, and the semi-old-school-look parks are nice.

I do think it would be fun to see the next new park go stainless steel and glass, clean lines, ergonomic, usability and comfort over traditional. It wuold be interesting to put the designers of the iPod on a staduim. I dont the diciplines dont cross over, but you get my idea.

[HurricaneDavid]

I do think it would be fun to see the next new park go stainless steel and glass, clean lines, ergonomic, usability and comfort over traditional.

That is one of the ideas for the new Nationals stadium in DC:

"The outdoor design includes a lot of glass, similar to the Washington Convention Center."

Tom Boswell said "The entire side of the park that faces South Capital Street is so open that the park would glow like a magic lantern into the city at night."

[griffelh]

You know what, I don't care what the Mets get as long as it is new. Cookie cutter, clone of another park, doesn't matter. Shea is old, dreary and falling apart. ANything new is an improvement!