The Pitch at Wyman-Gordon Field, Take II

Proposed Wyman-Gordon Field with Proposed Airline BRT (Red) and Trolley (Green) Public Transportation Stops

I discussed building a soccer specific stadium for the New England Revolution in a previous post, it is by far the most viewed of my recent posts. In the comments, Harry T. points out that I'm not the first/only one with this thought: See this post from late 2006 by Harry Tembenis (Harry T. I presume?) on Bill Randall's blog about Harry's idea of building a stadium on the Wyman-Gordon site for a Canadian Football League team. Also see this post from this summer on Paulie's blog about the Worcester World Cup event and David Z.'s comment "every time I drive by the former Wyman Gordon’s wasteland at Kelly Square, I think it would be a perfect location for a soccer only stadium for the New England Revolution."

I think the CFL expansion team is a great idea. Based on what Harry said in the 2006 post, the 20-25,000 seating capacity needed for the Revolution appears to work for a CFL team. I had suggested Holy Cross football could move it's games to Wyman-Gordon Field (the seating capacity also would appear to be the right size for this use too), but a Worcester based CFL team would be another great option instead of (or perhaps in addition to?) Holy Cross football. With Pats tickets almost impossible to get/too expensive for most, there may indeed be enough demand throughout New England to support a CFL team in Worcester. In the 2006 post Harry talked about the CFL possibly expanding with a few US franchises, I checked out the CFL website are there are still no US teams, does anyone know if the CFL still has plans to expand into the US?

The current lack of infrastructure in general and public transportation in particular was mentioned on Paulie's blog as a reason why the Revolution would not be interested in Worc. I would agree that there is not enough public transportation infrastructure in place today, but between the underway doubling of MBTA service between Worcester and Boston, the development of a bus rapid transit system connecting ORH and Union Station (with a Wyman-Gordon Field stop) and a tourist targeted trolley loop that would take visitors from Gateway Park to Union Station then through the Canal District and deliver them to the front door of Wyman-Gordon Field, I think we have the makings of a pretty good public transit infrastructure to support the stadium.

Of course, many will come by car, which leads to images of a gridlocked Kelley Square. Like any stadium in an urban area, traffic and parking plans will need to be studied closely. Parking in the Green Island residential neighborhoods should be limited to residents only during events. Event based street closings and select one-ways in Green Island might also be considered to keep non-residents out of this residential area. Looking at the image above, I think it's important to note that the stadium is located in an area I call the Junction District and not in Kelley Square itself. Those coming from Boston, SE MA and Providence will likely arrive at the stadium via 146 and Quinsigamond Ave, thus avoiding Kelley Square; those coming from Hartford, Springfield and points west will likely be entering via 290 E (though the 146 exit is a viable option from this direction in this case, old habits die hard - I speak from personal experience!) and could be directed to use Southbridge St., thus avoiding Kelley Square and those coming from Maine, NH and northeast and northcentral MA will be coming into the city by 290 W - these users would be the ones most likely to use the Kelley Square exit - but I would think that signage could encourage users to exit at either Lincoln St. or MLK Blvd. and either 1) park at Gateway Park (Lincoln St. exit) or City Square or Union Station (MLK Blvd. exit) and ride the trolley or Airline to the stadium, or 2) drive down the Major Taylor to Foster (the recent pedestrianization of Foster St. being a nice change to the car dominated design of most of Worcester's streets (Worcester slogan suggestion #215: "Worcester, a City that walks!")) to McGrath stretch and enter the stadium from the west, thus avoiding Kelley Square.