Progress continues on the construction of a new Amarillo ballpark, which is slated to open next year for the relocating San Antonio Missions (Class AA; Texas League).
Work is underway on the ballpark, with crews aiming to complete construction in time for the beginning of the 2019 Texas League season. Construction began in March, and work has been unfolding steadily in the months since.
Construction of the ballpark is moving at a solid pace, and Major League Baseball recently granted its approval to the design specifications of the facility. Signs of the what the finished product will look like are already taking shape, and officials anticipate even more progress over the summer months. More from The Amarillo Globe-News:
During Wednesday’s Amarillo Local Government Corporation Board of Directors meeting Amarillo Director of Facilities and Capital Projects Jerry Danforth said the City received notification of the approval this week.
“Basically, that’s the middle process that takes place with our architects,” he said. “Our architects are accustomed to working with major league and minor league teams, so their whole process is put together by major league baseball. We have those parameters before the design work even starts. What we do is take those design standards they have given us and send the completed plans to major league baseball, who takes a look at it to determine if we have done what we said we were going to do. They then give us final approval. We felt very comfortable going in from the beginning, because we knew the scope and our architects and with their experience executing these types of projects, we felt we would be fine.”
Danforth said by the end of this week crews will have a complete concrete ring of footings around the interior of the field and a sizable portion of the outfield wall would been finished. He said the dugout suites are being formed and are ready for concrete to be poured while one dugout has already been poured and the other should be poured this week.
“Our structural steel is scheduled to start showing up the last week in June,” Danforth said. “Once that happens, the first week in July we’ll begin to see materials coming out of the ground. We’re ahead of schedule on our dirt contract and ahead of schedule on our concrete contract, but we can’t say we’re overall ahead of schedule until all of our raw materials show up on site. At that point in time we feel pretty confident we would still be able to maintain the time we have been able to capture to date.”
The Missions are moving to the new Amarillo ballpark next season, but the Amarillo club will not use the Missions name. The Missions name and brand will remain in San Antonio, as the Colorado Springs Sky Sox (Class AAA; Pacific Coast League) will begin play there next season. This is all part of a series of franchise shifts by the Elmore Sports Group, which will also relocate the Helena Brewers (Rookie; Pioneer League) to Colorado Springs to take the place of the Sky Sox. Amarillo is the only community to commit to a new ballpark thus far, though officials with the Elmore Sports Group say they’ll need one in San Antonio as well.
RELATED STORIES: Name The Team Contest on Tap in Amarillo; New Amarillo Ballpark Construction Begins March 5; Ground Broken on New Amarillo Ballpark; Amarillo to Vote on Ballpark Construction Contract; Amarillo Awards Ballpark Construction Contract; Elmore Sports Group Signs Amarillo Ballpark Lease; Amarillo Ballpark Design Concept Receives Approval; Catching Up With Old and New Amarillo Ballparks; First Look at Amarillo Ballpark Concepts; Elmore Sports Group: Three Franchise Shifts in 2019