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$159.5 million
See Editor’s Note at the bottom of this story for why the cost estimate for Polar Park has increased to $159.5 million.
Before announcing their plan in August 2018 to bring the Pawtucket Red Sox minor league baseball team to Worcester, city and team leaders already decided exactly where and when the team would move.
A stadium would be built mostly on a hillside parking lot, and where five commercial buildings once stood in the Canal District. The team would start play in its new home in April 2021, since its stadium lease in Pawtucket ended in 2020.
Those decisions – where and when – would send both the city and the now renamed Worcester Red Sox down a fast-moving, complicated path, pushing costs up from the initial $100.8 million estimate to the newly updated $159.5 million today. The site proved far more challenging than even expected, the design plans remained unfinalized until well after construction began, and the ambitious 31-month planning and con
WORCESTER The Worcester Redevelopment Authority Friday authorized its chairman to execute a lease agreement with the Worcester Red Sox.
The 3-0 vote will allow one of the last pieces of the deal between the team and the city to bring the top minor league affiliate of the Boston Red Sox to Polar Park, the city-owned ballpark under construction in the Canal District, to fall into place.
Earlier this week, the City Council voted to advertise a loan order to partially cover $17 million in overruns on the ballpark project. The city is handling the financing on the overruns for the team, but the team is responsible for them. In return for the financing, the team agreed to renegotiate several items in the finalized lease agreement, including an extension of the lease for use of the ballpark from 30 to 35 years; an extension of the team s commitment not to relocate from 15 to 25 years; the removal of sponsorship guarantees on the part of the city; and a bigger cut of advertising rev
The Worcester Red Sox s lease with the city to play for up to 35 years in Polar Park was approved Friday by the Worcester Redevelopment Authority.
The long-anticipated lease agreement commits the WooSox to play at Polar Park for at least 25 years, starting as soon as April. The team is also picking up the entirety of a $17-million cost overrun announced last week, an increase that brings the project s total cost to roughly $157 million.
The authority, a city body that is the technical owner of the ballpark site and gives direct oversight to the project, approved the lease unanimously.
Authority members, like their City Council colleagues, have dismissed concerns about the ballpark s costs or likelihood of being financially prudent for Worcester.
Worcester City Councilors maintained strong support for the city-built Polar Park baseball stadium Tuesday night days after the project s latest total cost of $157 million was made public.
Councilors on Tuesday touted both tangible and intangible benefits from the ballpark: new property tax revenue Polar Park will bring in, making up for the city s costs for building it through new proposed developments on surrounding parcels, as well as the pride and buzz the project has brought to Worcester.
Councilor Gary Rosen dismissed criticism of the project, which has included questions about the project s rising costs. Thank God that we didn t listen to those folks, he said. I feel bad for the naysayers.