Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, May 14, 1995 TAG: 9505150065
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JACK BOGACZYK
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Salem's new ballpark, a dinger in drawings, won't come up short. When the construction dust clears - and that still will take awhile, even after the Avalanche moves in next month - a diamond and what surrounds it should shine.
In recent months, there has been much hand-wringing, carping and apologizing about the cost of the new facility and the unfinished business that has the Carolina League franchise still playing at creaking Municipal Field.
Here's a prediction: When the Avalanche and the public get into the new palace, much of what has been said will be snowed under. The Class A team is going to wake up one morning in June and think the franchise has moved to Triple-A.
Yes, a park first pegged at $5 million will cost more than $9 million to build. It also should be remembered that it took Durham, N.C., about two years and a lot more money to build a similar ballpark - plus a grandstand roof - to the one Salem will have finished in less than a year.
That's because six days a week for double-digit hours each of those days, more than 100 construction workers have built it so we will come. There's no way the Avalanche can hustle any more when it moves in than the workers are hustling there now. While others are climbing the walls about the park's opening, others are literally finishing the walls.
There's already a certain pride in the place. That was very apparent a few days ago during a personal tour of the park. Lee Wilhelm, president of J.M. Turner & Co., the general contractor on the project, took me from top to bottom in the stadium, even though the elevator hasn't been installed.
We stood in the huge dugouts. We tried out the seats behind home plate. We stood in the showers. We walked to the elevated picnic area near the left-field bullpen. The sky boxes, the press box, the concession stands that open to the field side all promise to offer unique experiences.
Imagine what it will be like when it's completed, when the brick arches will warm the park's exterior, when the stairway columns are glassed in, when the 80-foot flagpole goes up, when the fans flow in through the wide, welcoming plaza entrance behind home plate and head for their individual seats that are the same style that occupy the newest big-league parks.
No bleacher bums here. Basically, with wide rows and chair-back seats, Salem has a comfortable 6,300 seats in what could be a 9,000-seat ballpark.
Wilhelm said that barring a monsoonish month, the park should be ready for a June 20 opening as the Avalanche starts the second half of the Carolina League's season. Construction will continue, and Wilhelm hopes the crews can basically have a finished product by mid-August, although the firm's contract with the city doesn't require completion until October.
``I'd say we'll have about a 70 percent finished product by June 20,'' Wilhelm said. ``The major concern will be ensuring public safety, and we've addressed all of those issues and will continue to address them.''
The park needs about a mile of aluminum railing installed atop walls. Between that railing and the top of the concourse walls will be a short protective screen of aluminum mesh. All of that must be custom-made. It will arrive in sections, and until it's all installed, the park will have some temporary chain-link screens for fans' protection.
``Aesthetically, it won't be quite what it will be,'' Wilhelm said of the temporary solution. ``It's not a big deal, though. We wanted to get the team in here to play ball. All of the brickwork won't be done by June 20. But there's an advantage here you don't have when someone occupies a new building, where people are there all of the time. Here, even after the team moves in, you can still work until about 4 p.m. every day, and you have stretches where the team is out of town and you can work.''
And that's what will happen. A few inconveniences will be a small price to pay. The hot dogs will be hot, the beer cold. Life goes on. As for those Municipal regulars who have fretted about the loss of the wonderful mountain backdrop with the move, there are two things the new park promises besides wind blowing right to left, foul pole to foul pole.
The view is different. It also is a spectacular panorama.
Even through dusty lenses you can see that. We just have to be patient. It's worth the wait.
In 1927, Municipal Field wasn't built in a day, either.
by CNB