Corktown group pushes plan for Tiger Stadium

[RustTown]

I'm kind of confused. I had thought the city had already made a deal with another group concerning all of the sites around the field, last year:

Corktown group pushes plan for Tiger Stadium

A new conservancy formed by the Greater Corktown Development Corp. is working on plans to redevelop the baseball field at Tiger Stadium into a park for youth sports programs and is talking with the Michigan Sports Hall of Fame about making the site its permanent home

[statedude3]

Yeah, I agree- this is a confusing scenario.

The last I heard there was going to be an auction in the spring. Now it sounds as if there is no plan to sell stuff, no plan to demolish part of the stadium, and no plan to build that mix use thing.

(that is the coolest smilie of them all!)

[Michi]

You aren't the least bit surprised are you? This isn't so bad, but media announcements in Detroit development projects are usually about 3% accurate in terms of a timeline.

[RustTown]

Well, after a more close read, I don't get any impression that the city has, at all, delayed the Spring demolition of the stadium. In fact, it doesn't sound like they are much interested in this proposal. It seems to me that the Michigan Sports Hall of Fame now has to race against the clock and come up with a viable plan. I sounds like a deperate 11th Hour proposal that's most likely not going to happen.

[detwaa84]

Actually, according to the article, the city does not want this proposal off the table. they still plan to auction, demolish, and preserve the park and in its place include mixed uses, one of which could be the planned sports hall of fame. I don't see where this proposal has changed other than being added to. However, If this causes any more delay, then forget it (as the city stated), let's get that big box outa there and put something useful. Sorry if that offended!

[Allan]

The Tiger Stadium project is extremely unique. It is a massive undertaking, especially since nobody has ever undertaken a project quite like this anywhere. The project will be developed over several phases over perhaps 10 years. There are still a lot of talks going on. Some parts of the plan have progressed, but others are still very conceptual. Not much is set in stone yet, although they do have a few developers on board. At this point, the city is really keeping all of their options open. It sounds like they've kind of discounted the Hall of Fame proposal, but haven't given up complete hope for it...not yet, anyway.

[Allan]

The demolition of Tiger Stadium is moving forward. Crews have been busy this week removing seats. It's no small job, but they are moving pretty quickly. Here's one final shot (actually there will be more to come, but not for a few days).

A crew of photographers spent 3 months taking 6000 sepia photos as documentation. I couldn't even come close in my 1.5 hours there, but I tried!

[Zissou]

Lucky beotch. Great shot.

[Allan]

Thanks. There are a lot more photos from Tiger Stadium here.

As promised, here are a few more photos. I took about 200 photos. Most of them turned out ok...I just wish they could've moved the 18-wheeler off the field. I was feeling overwhelmed in there. My eyes didn't know where exactly to turn. This was a one-shot deal, and it was quick. I could've spent 3 days in there! There were photo opportunities everywhere! I felt like I was thrown back in time to 1999. Only this time, I was being escorted through the stadium by officials, and rather than the roar of baseball fans, there were the sounds of chainsaws in the background, as the seats were being cut up and removed.

The turnstyles, right inside the gate at Michigan and Trumbull

Something tells me that isn't the original home plate! Oh well, we brought a baseball and played around anyway.

In a couple places weeds have taken over the seats.

Catwalk to the upper deck seats.

The lower deck. I think this is one of my favorite photos from the trip.

The field from the upper deck, complete with the 18-wheeler. If you look on the lower deck, you can see where they've started removing seats.

Upper Deck

One final shot before exiting the field

[Ka3kab]

Awsome pictures, as usual. It kind of made me sad looking at that picture of the seats with the weeds growing out of it. Not that I don't like Comerica (I wish they would change the name back to Tiger Stadium) but I still like the old stadium better.

[ZachariahDaMan]

Demolition is suppose to begin in May or June. The deadling to raise money to save part of it is June 1.

http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article...7L99acrPNhg4%3D

[detroitfan]

I have to agree with the DEGC, if the conservancy can't come up with the money then the whole thing should go. The fact that they've been around a year, but can't come up with 369K out of a $ 15 million project doesn't bode very for future fundraising. I kinda of had a feeling that they were in trouble just by the fact that their website that was supposed to go live months ago is still dormant.