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Ground broken on new Yankee Stadium

Boss helps launch construction of $1 billion project, to be done by 2009

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'I hope it's wonderful'
Aug. 16: Yankees owner George Steinbrenner and baseball commissioner Bud Selig comment at the groundbreaking ceremony for construction of a new Yankee Stadium.

Manuel Perez, a lifelong neighborhood resident who was playing with his two children in the park, said the area’s resurgence had meant only higher rents and other costs of living and a new stadium was unlikely to help.

“It’s not going to do anything for my community,” he said. “Whether we say yes or whether we say no, they’re going to do it anyway.”

The 53,000-seat open-air ballpark will replace one of the most famous sports arenas in the world, christened with a Ruth home run on Opening Day. Designers plan to restore several elements of the original stadium, including the frieze that hung from the roof, that were lost in a 1970s remodeling.

Yankee Stadium is the third-oldest ballpark in the major leagues, trailing Boston’s Fenway Park (1912) and Chicago’s Wrigley Field (1914).

The city and state are contributing more than $200 million to the project, including infrastructure improvements. The Yankees will pay the rest, financed through taxable and tax-exempt bonds.

Until a dozen years ago, Steinbrenner had denigrated the neighborhood as dangerous and threatened to move the team to Manhattan or northern New Jersey. But the Yankees expect to draw more than 4 million fans to the stadium this year, making it the eighth consecutive season topping 3 million.

The new stadium will have fewer seats than the current capacity, 57,478, but more luxury boxes. Chief operating officer Lonn Trost said the ballpark would continue to be called Yankee Stadium rather than be named for the highest corporate bidder, though parts of the park would be sponsored.

Construction of the new stadium will involve paving over large portions of Macombs Dam Park and Mullaly Park and cutting down about 400 mature oak trees. The Yankees are to offset the loss of the parks by building new parkland, including three ball fields at the site of the current Yankee Stadium, which will be dismantled.

Backers say the project will create an estimated 3,600 construction jobs and 900 permanent jobs. But the plan met with opposition from some South Bronx neighbors and parks advocates.

Geoffrey Croft, president of New York City Parks Advocates, said the stadium foes would appeal Tuesday’s ruling and file a federal lawsuit.

“The Yankees were never required to consider practical alternatives to the taking of parkland,” he said.

© 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.


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