Build it, and will they come?

It's time to end this long, drawn-out debate over the best site for a new baseball stadium in Richmond.

The Shockoe Bottom location represents the only real momentum we have toward a ballpark. Highwoods Proper ties, which has proposed the Shockoe Center development, appears to be the big-league player in the batter's box.

Mayor Dwight C. Jones is correct in saying there is no consensus on the ballpark. But if we wait to build consensus, we'll never build a ballpark. People are entrenched in their points of view.

The ever-cautious Jones must lead here, moving various parties and re gional partners beyond self-interest.

I still believe that aesthetically, a spot on the south bank of the James River would be a grand slam, but that's not going to happen. As for The Diamond site on the Boulevard, a sports-facility consultant said it best:

"It would be a generational mistake to build again at The Diamond site," said Patrick Zohn. "It would be the mistake of history repeating itself. It runs counter to what any responsible firm or entity involved with urban planning would tell you."

Everyone but Richmond seems to know downtown is the place to go. Frankly, it's easy to envision a ballpark in the Bottom if you could build one that wouldn't flood.

Don't tell me that the suburbanites won't come to Shockoe Bottom. Part of the attachment to The Diamond, I'd argue, is at least partially rooted in an irrational fear of downtown. But I suspect that for hardcore baseball fans, the love of the sport would eventually outweigh those fears. As they said in "Field of Dreams," build it and they will come.

The Shockoe stadium would be as convenient to interstate access as The Diamond. Parking is a genuine concern, but nothing a conventional solution such as a parking deck or a more creative approach, such as ballpark shuttles from the'burbs, wouldn't solve.

Incorporating a GRTC Transfer Center into the project, as Jones wants to do, would help here.

Not that everyone would be driving or taking a bus to the games. A downtown stadium would produce the rarest of rarities at a Richmond sporting event: walk-up customers.

Naysayers have predicted that a Shockoe Bottom ballpark would be the next white elephant to grace the Richmond landscape, joining such structures as the late and unlamented 6th Street Marketplace. But the marketplace was an act of faith pursued in the face of declining downtown retail trends. This ballpark would join a wave of urban investment in such structures.

The most disturbing aspect of this plan for me is its potential to wreak havoc on the sensitive slave-trade history of Shockoe Bottom. Shockoe Center development should be conditioned on preserving and presenting this history. This project may be the best opportunity to do so.

We've wasted an awful lot of time dreaming about a ball field instead of building one. This Shockoe Bottom proposal offers us the best chance to go the distance.

Contact Michael Paul Williams at (804) 649-6815 or .