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Squeeze is on near ballpark site: Time, space are both short

With work quickly moving ahead on the Minnesota Twins stadium, some worry about the potential for design mistakes in the crowded area.

By Mike Kaszuba and Linda Mack, Star Tribune
Last update: December 29, 2006 – 11:39 PM

As a new stadium for the Minnesota Twins speeds toward construction, design experts worry the project's fast pace will create a human traffic jam outside the ballpark.

The $522 million stadium project is moving forward as plans to build a light-rail line, commuter rail line and regional bike path next to the stadium in a relatively tight area are coming together simultaneously. A cramped platform for rail passengers and a wall between the stadium and the neighborhood are just two of the concerns.

"We have to design the whole experience," said Thomas Fisher, the dean of the University of Minnesota's College of Design, who has been watching the stadium's complicated planning unfold. "If we don't do it, we're heading to a lot of criticism."

Fisher's comments have been echoed over the past month by a variety of experts, including Hennepin County Commissioner Mike Opat, the County Board's lead negotiator for the stadium.

They say the light-rail station to be built outside the stadium's left-field wall may not have enough room for the 4,000 fans who are expected to get on and off the trains at every game.

Rather than unloading on a broad plaza like that at the Metrodome, where the Twins now play, passengers will arrive and leave the ballpark in a space about 23 feet wide, roughly the width of a double garage.

Dan Kenney, executive director of the Minnesota Ballpark Authority, which will own the stadium, said the tight spaces are part of creating an urban ballpark. "If you go to a Cubs game in Chicago, you know that if you take a train 15 minutes before the game, it's going to be more crowded," he said. "Fans will get that. It's part of the experience, and it works. It's worked in Chicago."

With work at the stadium site expected to begin as soon as three months from now, the multiple public agencies that are in charge of the ballpark, light rail, commuter rail and bike path projects are racing not only to move ahead with their own plans but also to keep abreast of what the others are doing.

'No one's in charge'

Others worry that not enough attention is being paid to make sure that the neighborhoods around the stadium, where related development is expected to occur, are not inadvertently walled off -- literally. As things stand, an 8-foot-high wall along the light-rail line will keep pedestrians from crossing N. 5th Street near the ballpark.

The new Ballpark Implementation Committee, which was created to oversee infrastructure issues at the stadium, has met twice, but officials from Hines Interests, the Texas company that has plans to develop much of the area around the ballpark, have not attended.

"No one's in charge," said Chuck Leer, a developer who headed a team that recommended a series of design guidelines for the stadium and surrounding area.

"The irony about this is everybody says this can't be another Metrodome. Some of the things are better at the Metrodome."

Officials said there may be time later to make changes, and they point to the Hiawatha light-rail line, connecting downtown Minneapolis with the Mall of America. The line has received wide acclaim, despite a series of construction setbacks and on-the-fly modifications.

"There are some apparent design challenges," said Lee Sheehy, who heads Minneapolis' main economic development agency. "That would be true wherever you put one million square feet that attracts 40,000 people."

Sheehy disputed claims that no one public agency is in charge, saying the city has assumed a large role and has had "frankly more input than usual."

But the concerns have mounted.

A 'physically complex' site

The Minneapolis chapter of the American Institute of Architects, in an October letter, said the stadium site is "physically complex," with many moving parts. While "engineering of the alignment and platform location is all but set" to extend the Hiawatha light- rail line to the ballpark, the letter said, "the design of the ballpark's entrances, sidewalks and plaza has just begun."

Opat expressed his own worries at a meeting two weeks ago that the light-rail station's design is "not pedestrian friendly." Through a countywide sales tax that will take effect next week, Hennepin County is providing much of the money for the stadium's construction. The state's most populous county also played a major role in the Hiawatha line's construction.
If nothing is done to alter the light-rail station's design, said Opat, "it's going to stand out like a sore thumb."

His comments drew concerns from a lead official for the Northstar commuter rail line, which is awaiting critical federal approval and whose own station at the ballpark will be integrated with the light-rail station.

"If we were to reopen and revisit some of the final design, it would have very deleterious schedule impacts and would exceed the $307 million [Northstar] project budget," said Mark Fuhrmann, a Metro Transit official who serves as Northstar's project director.

The much-delayed commuter rail project would offer daily passenger service from Big Lake, Minn., which is about halfway between Minneapolis and St. Cloud, to downtown Minneapolis, and connect at the stadium to the Hiawatha light-rail line. The Hiawatha line would be extended along N. 5th Street from 1st Avenue N.

Opat said this week that he hopes there is still time to make changes. "It's just going to be a scramble to get all the right people in a room to agree to it," he said.

Bike trail debate

The same uncertainty surrounds the Cedar Lake regional bike trail, which is intended to weave around the stadium and continue to the Mississippi River.

In a meeting just before Christmas, however, trail proponents rejected three options floated by project officials.

Although officials have touted the bike path as yet another way for fans to arrive at the stadium, Chuck Ballentine, deputy coordinator of the ballpark project, said trail proponents are largely uninterested in aligning the trail so that it could interact with the stadium.

"We want ... people to get past the stadium with great ease," said Ruth Jones, a board member of the Cedar Lake Park Association. Jones said the stadium should accommodate the bike path and not vice versa.

"Can they have a few less feet for grandstands?" she said. "Can they have a few less concessions?"Would we have asked for a site just a little bit bigger?" said Ballentine. "Sure. But we've got to work with what we've got."


mkaszuba@startribune.com "¢ 612-673-4388 lmack@startribune.com "¢ 612-673-7124