urbanSTL

joelkamp wrote:So when does the summer officially end? According to KSDK Bill Dewitt Jr. said ballpark village will start by the end of the summer. So, what’s the over/under on this latest prediction?

Ballpark Village Still A Pit





By Mike Owens, I-Team Reporter



(KSDK) -- For 18 months, St. Louisans have been watching the hole where the old Busch Stadium used to be, waiting for rebirth.



So far, all they've seen is a mud hole when it rains and a dustbowl when it doesn't. The 12-acre site is to be the home of the Ballpark Village, a development that has changed over the last year and a half, from a condo complex with some offices and shops, to mostly an office complex with shops and restaurants; those changes prompted by the tanking housing market.



One thing that hasn't changed is the city's financial involvement in the project. The city is kicking in $115 million worth of what's called "tax increment financing."



Mayor Francis Slay said that's not actual money, but future money. The developers, the St. Louis Cardinals and the Cordish Company of Baltimore, will build the complex, and any incremental increase in tax revenue won't go to the city but will instead go to help pay for the development.



But baseball fans are getting frustrated, and some are actually worried that St. Louis will look bush league because of the hole when Busch Stadium hosts the 2009 Major League All-Star Game.



However, Bill DeWitt III, the Cardinals' team president, said he's hopeful that visitors won't see a hole in the ground. Instead, they'll see construction underway in the hole in the ground.



DeWitt said all the necessary work will be completed by the end of summer 2008 in order to get started with actual construction. That's good for DeWitt, because under the current proposal, which still hasn't been given final government approval, the team would have to pay the city $3 million a year if the project does not move forward.



The project stumbled in March, when a major tenant, the Centene Corporation of Clayton, backed out of a deal to develop two blocks as their national headquarters. Centene is a health management firm.



The deal collapsed under its own weight, according to those who know what happened. They said that Cordish and Centene could not agree to the basics of a deal, like where to site the buildings and where to put parking.



Now, DeWitt said the project is back to its original footprint, making it easier to get moving.



Barb Geisman, the city's development director, said the city has done all it can to urge the development, and there will be no more public subsidy offered to the Ballpark Village.



Geisman said she's confident the Cardinals and Cordish will get the project underway, satisfying thousands of baseball fans.



The big hole is right outside DeWitt's office window and he said the fact he sees it everyday does put him under a certain amount of pressure. He adds that pressure is prompting him to work harder on the project.

The big hole is right outside DeWitt's office window and he said the fact he sees it everyday does put him under a certain amount of pressure. He adds that pressure is prompting him to work harder on the project.

DeWitt said he's getting used to the water hole in the main hole being called "DeWitt's Pond."

DrDrew wrote:Maybe I'm a bit slow, but I really don't understand the reluctance to build a condo tower here. Even the most anti-city hoosiers I know say that a condo overlooking the stadium would sell like hotcakes. The national residential market is terrible now, but it seems that this project would have a recession-proof source of demand.

some are actually worried that St. Louis will look bush league because of the hole when Busch Stadium hosts the 2009 Major League All-Star Game.

Bush league is a general term used to describe an action or thing as being amateur, inferior or crude. In a literal sense, it refers to a low quality minor-league in baseball not associated with any of the major league teams. The term originated from the state of minor-league fields that often were ringed with shrubs and bushes.

DrDrew wrote:Even the most anti-city hoosiers I know say that a condo overlooking the stadium would sell like hotcakes.