Exclusive: Developers drop Shockoe ballpark project
Highwoods Properties
Developers had proposed a $363 million project in Shockoe Bottom that would include a baseball stadium residential and commercial areas.
A plan for baseball in Shockoe Bottom is dead.
Developers of the proposed Shockoe Center ballpark announced this afternoon that they're walking away from the project as well as a proposal for development along the Boulevard.
"We have carried these projects as far as our collaborative team can under the present circumstances," the development team led by Highwoods Properties said in a statement released to the Richmond Times-Dispatch.
The developers said their efforts aimed at revitalizing Shockoe Bottom and the Boulevard have been overshadowed by debate over the ballpark.
They also said the "good faith" but ultimately unsuccessful effort by a group of local investors to buy a baseball team had "fundamentally altered the way minor-league baseball will now return to Richmond.
"The city will need to negotiate directly with any new team owner on such issues as location, timing and financing of a new ballpark."
A statement from Mayor Dwight C. Jones is forthcoming, according to his press secretary, Tammy D. Hawley.
For more details on why the plan was dropped, see tomorrow's Times-Dispatch.
-- Will Jones
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Reader Reactions
Congratulations Richmond! Enjoy the gas station and the run down parking lot in Shockoe Bottom. By the way, now that the stadium is off the table watch how fast that important slave trail is suddenly nobody’s concern again.
Shocking! Richmond can’t seal a deal for baseball’s return? This is why the city will always be a second rate town with a declining population. Now what will all those people who are moving into those expensive lofts and condos do for fun? Oh yeah, travel outside the city. We’ll get pro sports back here in 2010 when the Sportsquest complex opens in Chesterfield.
Excellent news! Now if Jones can NOT HIRE Marshall, we (the City of Richmond) may well be on its way toward progress!
Sorry people, $ 360 million with the City of Richmond on the hook for it is not smart - no matter how you cut it.
If these were the go-go 90’s maybe; but those days are long gone folks.
Great! No hockey and No baseball. What parent would of liked to of taken the children out to see baseball game anyway. Oh wait, me!
Someone said “non-essential” sports. I’d like to know what that person thinks IS essential in Richmond. I bet the list contains some of the more boring things in life. This most definitely comes from a person that never has played sports, denounces the benefits of playing a sport (golf, online games) dont count. I for one like the entertainment that comes with a local team. And, college sports are great, but I like watching a higher level. I like the environment at sporting events and its a shame that Richmond is a step in the opposite direction for getting one back. To the geekish boring people out there, we dont care.
Highwoods Properties finally is having to admit that the project was not viable unless millions of tax dollars and concessions were given by the city. I commend the city in not being snookered once again by developers hoping to get rich and the handful of fans who want others to pay for their non-essential sports.
Friggin great. Now I guess the chances of watching a baseball game at a Richmond ball park is years down the line, if ever. I’m very discouraged.
Small time mentalities yield small time results.
Hence, no baseball in Richmond.
The vision of people who opposed this project are content with 2nd hand clothes stores and “for lease” signs in the neighborhood.
Talk about living with their heads in the sand.
I don’t believe this can be characterized as being an edict from the people. Rather, the developer’s decision clearly demonstrates that Mayor Jones cannot make hard tough decisions - either one or the other. As Mayor, he had a fiduciary duty to the people to speak in a clear forceful voice - again - either one way or the other. He did not. He put his head in the sand and hoped someone would decide for him. They did. We the people have learned a valuable lesson about our Mayor. He lacks the “right stuff” when it comes to making tough hard decisions.
THANK GOODNESS!!! Hopefully this is now one headache (of many) that we won’t have to worry about…for a while at least!!! Now, on to the next ignorant thing they’re planning!
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