Farewell to Turner Field? (merged)

[Benjamin Grimm]

USA Today wrote: Atlanta Braves announce plans to move to new stadium ATLANTA -- The Atlanta Braves announced Monday morning they plan to move to Cobb County in 2017. According to a published report, the team is set to leave Turner Field after their 20-year agreement expires at the end of the 2016 season. Originally the Centennial Olympics Stadium, the venue was built for the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, hosting the opening and closing ceremonies. After the Olympics, the stadium was reconstructed into baseball-specific Turner Field and the Braves began playing there in 1997. The team says they plan to build a new stadium on the northwest corner of the Interstate 75-285 interchange in Cobb County. "We are excited to announce plans to build a world-class stadium, which will open in 2017 at the NW intersection of I-75/I-285," the team said in tweets. "We have secured a large tract of property at this location & will work to build a world-class ballpark for our fans."

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

Announced plans to build a new park in suburban Cobb County to begin play in 2017.

Wow.

Apparently their 20-year lease is up on Turner in 2016, and they say the park needs infrastructure investment. They also say there are too few parking spaces and also, nobody goes there because of traffic. Uh.

[Edgy MD]

"In what is being hailed as a victory for rich people everywhere and a great opportunity for Atlanta Braves players to shorten their commutes... ."

[Guest themetfairy]

Wow is right.

Our trip to Turner Field in 1997 was MK's first road trip. He wasn't even a year old at the time. It's mind blowing to think that a stadium opened in his lifetime is being trashed so quickly.

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

How awful of them.

Just for the record, Turner Field is an ugly mallpark but at least it was in the city limits of Atlanta. Another Olympic white elephant.

[MFS62]

I drove through Atlanta seven years apart. The traffic pylons they put up for construction on rt 75 as it went past the Ted were still there - the construction was never finished. Good luck with the new stadium being completed on time, much less the access roads.

Later

[Benjamin Grimm]

Looking at Google Maps (and assuming I picked the correct intersection) it looks like the new ballpark will be about 13 miles north of where Turner Field is.

20-plus years is not a very long life for a baseball stadium. I wonder if they'll demolish it, or find some other use.

[MFS62]

That far?
By the time you buy your hot dogs and (fabulously greasy) onion rings at The Varsity, they'll be cold by the time you get to the new ball park.
http://www.thevarsity.com/locations.php

Later

[Ceetar]

John Cougar Lunchbucket wrote: How awful of them. Just for the record, Turner Field is an ugly mallpark but at least it was in the city limits of Atlanta. Another Olympic white elephant.

I'm so glad Citi Field didn't end up being part of the Olympics build.

[Guest sharpie]

Terrible move for the Braves. Baseball teams tend to do better in the midst of cities. I won't miss that ballpark but I bet the new one will be worse.

[Gwreck]

2017 opening date means that baseball will have gone 5 full years between opening new parks.

Last time that happened was 1982 (Metrodome) to 1989 (SkyDome).

[Ceetar]

Gwreck wrote: 2017 opening date means that baseball will have gone 5 full years between opening new parks. Last time that happened was 1982 (Metrodome) to 1989 (SkyDome).

barring something sudden. Team moving, Rays getting a real place, etc.

[Frayed Knot]

In the meantime, the city of Atlanta is replacing their football stadium - as if a twenty y/o domed stadium is somehow now obsolete and a drag for the team.
In that case the NFL probably told them they needed a new crib or no more Super Bowls.
In the case of the Braves, this sounds like a move to the whiter suburbs.

So does the city now demolish both of those "old" edifices?

[Ceetar]

This was the first year that the place hosted a game without Chipper Jones and now they want to get rid of it.

[MFS62]

Frayed Knot wrote: In the meantime, the city of Atlanta is replacing their football stadium - as if a twenty y/o domed stadium is somehow now obsolete and a drag for the team. In that case the NFL probably told them they needed a new crib or no more Super Bowls. In the case of the Braves, this sounds like a move to the whiter suburbs. So does the city now demolish both of those "old" edifices?

I'm not sure. The Georgia Dome is also the home field for Georgia Tech. (It may also be school property). If they build a new stadium for the NFL team, the Dome could still remain. I don't think the NFL is too find of a college steam sharing their facilities on a regular basis.

Later

[batmagadanleadoff]

What a tease. This just raises my unrealistic hope that Citi Field'll be demolished and replaced in my lifetime.

[Benjamin Grimm]

I know it's not gonna happen, but I'd like to see an American League team move into Turner Field.

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

batmagadanleadoff wrote: What a tease. This just raises my unrealistic hope that Citi Field'll be demolished and replaced in my lifetime.

lololololol

[Frayed Knot]

MFS62 wrote: I'm not sure. The Georgia Dome is also the home field for Georgia Tech. (It may also be school property). If they build a new stadium for the NFL team, the Dome could still remain.

It's not like the city needs TWO DOMES for approximately 15 or so football games.

I don't think the NFL is too fond of a college steam sharing their facilities on a regular basis.

Then they can pay for the fucking thing themselves if the horror of sharing the place is too big a burden for them, which, of course, they're not.

I hope for the sake of Cobb County that the Braves are footing the bill for their new place. They already own the AAA team and (I believe) the stadium in Gwinnett County to the north east of the city. The suburbs making up Gwinnett & Cobb (NW of the city) counties have become a hotbed of HS baseball over the last two decades or so (hell, it's been where the Braves have taken half their draft choices) so I suspect they think it'll get them more and better fans than those of blacker and more football-centric Atlanta itself. Either way it represents a reversal of moving towards city centers that's been going on since about the '70s.

[Ceetar]

Ted Berg breaks it down with a map (from homeofthebraves.com) that pretty much explains everything.

[Lefty Specialist]

Wow. Went to Turner Field in 2007, and while it wasn't great, it wasn't terrible. Much better scoreboard than Citi has even now.

And a newsflash- the traffic is terrible ANYWHERE in and around Atlanta. Their 'interchange' location will be calamitous on game nights.

[Edgy MD]

Check out the baseball maniacs in 30269!

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

That's where all of Chipper's ex-wives live.

[Guest d'Kong76]

batmagadanleadoff wrote: What a tease. This just raises my unrealistic hope that Citi Field'll be demolished and replaced in my lifetime.

Citi Field ain't all that bad, if you avoid the main entrance.

[Benjamin Grimm]

I saw the Mets play a couple of games in Atlanta in 1992, but that was in the old Fulton County Stadium days. I never got to Turner Field, although I suppose I had the opportunity. I was in Atlanta on business in October 1998 and there were still day-of-game tickets available for the NLCS. I considered heading down there and seeing the game, but ended up opting not to.

[G-Fafif]

Just in terms of time elapsed, this is the chronological equivalent of the Mets announcing in November of 1980 that by 1984 they'd leave Shea Stadium after 20 years. In real time, Shea got its first meaningful if cosmetic facelift over the previous 12 months -- in its 17th season -- and wasn't seriously (or at least publicly) put under the replacement microscope until Camden Yards made every facility look itself in the mirror in the early '90s.

I went to one game at Turner Field early in its second season. Thought it was a terrific place to watch baseball, which is never the thing these announcements touch on when they use phrases like "experience" and "world class". Though it might be a stretch, perhaps the freshness of Turner Field circa 1998 was as bound to wear off as that of Shea Stadium from 1965, thus it might be pointless for me to say I had a great time there when I went, so how can they be getting rid of it? I take it the Braves have figured they can make more money in their newly chosen location than they can where they've been since 1966.

Nevertheless, declaring the abandonment of a not obviously aged ballpark within two decades of its ballyhooed opening is mind-boggling.

[Edgy MD]

I went to the hearing that Congress convened after MLB announced it's intention to contract. Other topics that came up were the coming CBA war and drugs, and in fact the contraction threat was just MLB flexing it's muscle in anticipation of the coming CBA.

Then-Governor Jesse Ventura was a surprisingly effective witness for the cities facing the loss of their teams and being strongarmed into providing new facilities (strongarmed by the same maneuver that MLB was strongarming the MLBPA with --- well played, Commissioner Selig!). He insisted that he, as a former wrestler, could also see the issues from the perspective of an athlete. When this drew broad laughter, he angrily raised his voice, "Say what you will about wrestling, but we use existing facilities and pay rents set by the free marketplace." Nobody laughed at that one.

But his most damning testimony was showing pictures of the HHH Metrodome, and pointing out that the trees planted around the outside hadn't yet matured, and here he was being told that the league was firing the city because their facility was woefully out of date.

It was scored as "HR-Ventura" by any non-biased bookkeeper in the room. If only it was a 15th inning walkoff.

The Metrodome was about 17 at that time, if I remember correctly.

[Guest Mets � Willets Point]

This totally goes against the trend of baseball teams moving back into and/or solidifying their presence in urban centers. I expect the Braves are going to regret this one day.

[Guest LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr]

Hey, maybe if they build a new place, the fanbase will be less frontrunner-y!

Turner Field is in Atlanta the way Citi Field is in New York... peripherally, and ultimately, a park in the middle of parking lot ocean, rather than a neighborhood. Folks generally drive in/drive out; here's nothing nearby getting a Braves bump on gamedays/during summers. So, y'know, it's not like the city will actually suffer.

[Frayed Knot]

It's hard to know how slimy the Braves are being about all this without knowing what demands/promises/payments were being made back when it was decided that they would take over the reconfigured Olympic stadium but, whatever the case, it sounds like it's their decision to make now that the lease is running out.
As mentioned a couple times in this thread, this idea goes back to the future (or is it forward to the past?) of the suburban relocation era of the '70s (Landover, Md; Foxboro, MA; Auburn Hills, MI, etc.) -- and while that certainly goes against the recent trend and therefore sounds like the wrong decision in most cases, maybe it's not the wrong one for this particular team and area.

One would hope this would serve as a warning signal to cities lining up to give money to sports teams already owned by billionaires ... but we know it probably won't. I hope for Cobb County's sake that they're covering their ass on this one.