Urban Guy has been keeping up with the progress at the future home of Smokies baseball/multiuse stadium and residential development. I had the chance to tour last week and get behind the scenes. You can see by the photos from May and now in June that the project is moving along rapidly. I’m told it is on time and on budget thus far.
Mo Abbas, Lead Project Manager with Denark Construction, was our tour guide for the afternoon. He took us on each of the three levels of the project, as well as the home dugout and home plate. I was impressed with the project as a whole and the thoroughness of each step.
We walked through the home-side dugout onto the field and found home plate being marked by a Smokies flag. Mo showed us a geomarker that marks the actual spot where the tip of home plate will be. There are other markers on the field, and everything in the stadium was built around where these markers are located. In deciding the field’s orientation, they considered the trajectory of the sun/shade in a day, weather patterns and more.
One of the projects alongside the stadium is the Beauford Delaney Bldg. It is a nine-story residential space featuring 47 condos. All units are leased, and there is a 31-person waitlist. This building is along the right field between the stadium and downtown. Due to water-related issues in the ground that had to be resolved, the project is just now coming out of the ground.
Yardley Flats is a 235-apartment building with two sections of apartments. In the middle will be a pool and deck where residents can watch games and concerts at home. Over 50% of the units will have a full or partial view of the field.
The three floors we explored were the service floor, concourse, and club level.
On the service floor/bottom level, there will be over 22,000 square feet of retail space, including 2 team stores. The retail spaces have yet to be leased, but they are progressing well.
Also, on the service level is a smaller staircase leading to the batting tunnel, where teams can practice batting. The batting tunnel will have windows that fans can watch through as they prepare for the games.
In the visitor locker room will be 34 lockers, all wood, custom-made. The team locker rooms feature a kitchenette, lounge, laundry room, and bathrooms/showers. There are smaller locker rooms for mascots, female coaches, male coaches, storage and back-of-house closets, and major league officials. This level also has a physical therapy room, weight room and training room that both teams can use, coach’s locker rooms and offices. MLB requirements/rules were followed in the building plans, and you can see those reflected in the ceiling height and other amenities in the space.
VIP Entrance to the club level, elevators, and ADA gate access are on this level.
The main entrance to the stadium on the concourse level will be accessed via what they call the monumental staircase due to its size and grandeur. It is on the right-field side of the complex and leads to bathrooms, the batting tunnel, concessions, and seating.
The roof system contains cross-laminated timber in the ceiling and southern pine wood suitable for the outdoors, which adds warmth to the stadium that steel beams can’t bring. You will see this in the outdoor party decks, entrances and concession/bar areas. Mobile and portable concessions and multiple permanent concessions and bars will be throughout the stadium. The concourse will have flat, walkable space with mobile vendors and portables around the project, allowing you to walk around the stadium. You can stop at the right field bar with four rows of seating/picnic area or stand along the drink rails to stretch your legs. You can look down into the bullpen from the concourse as well.
A picnic area along the left side will have tables and is connected to the children’s area, with inflatables and other entertainment for kids.
The pitching mound is retractable and can be lowered for soccer games, concerts and other events. The scoreboard footers are in, but the massive 120-foot high/150-foot wide Tennessee-shaped scoreboard has not been installed yet.
On the club level, 13 suites will be rented season by season. However, you can rent one of the two party decks or loge boxes game by game. The last two club suites on each side connect to the party deck on its corresponding side.
Mo shared one of the construction traditions they followed to celebrate the completion of the last structural steel beam installed. Each person who has worked on the project signs the beam before it is painted, and they put up a Christmas tree and lit the tree to celebrate the completion. The crew did this and celebrated everyone who had worked on the project to that point.
There’s still much to do, but much has been done, and every day brings more visible progress.
