The city is evaluating proposals to replace The Diamond and redevelop 67 acres in and around the ballpark.
They gather under a tent in the parking lot, just beyond the outfield fences.
On a chilly weekday morning in mid-January, development teams from across the country are here to get a tour of what Richmond Economic Development Director Leonard Sledge calls “the best redevelopment site along the Eastern Seaboard.” Roughly three dozen people are seated in folding chairs facing the grandstands of The Diamond on Arthur Ashe Boulevard, amid a sea of asphalt. Despite a biting wind, the mood is upbeat.
The city has spent the past several years cobbling together parcels, demolishing and relocating city-owned buildings, and taking ownership of the baseball stadium in preparation for a major redevelopment. It now controls most of the 67 acres in and around The Diamond, save for 6.6 acres still owned by Virginia Commonwealth University.
After months of planning, the city released its vision for the area in late December, dubbing the ballpark-anchored site as Richmond’s “Diamond District.” Plans call for mixed-use, mixed-income residential housing and retail, office buildings, and a hotel in what’s arguably Richmond’s most valuable piece of undeveloped property. It sits at a vital regional gateway just off Interstates 95 and 64, bordered by a thriving Scott’s Addition, the Museum District and the Fan, along with reemerging residential neighborhoods on the city’s North Side.
“I just want to convey that Richmond is ripe for this development,” Sledge tells the assembled developers, making clear that whatever they dream up for the 67 acres as part of their initial proposals, it must revolve around a new baseball stadium for the Richmond Flying Squirrels. “The standards for minor league baseball stadiums and facilities, they have changed. And for us to remain competitive as a home for minor league baseball, the Flying Squirrels — they need a new home.”
After more than 20 years of debate and hand-wringing over replacing The Diamond, built in 1985 and home to the Squirrels since 2010, city officials say they are finally ready. As an outgrowth of the Richmond 300 master plan, in late December the city issued an initial “Request for Interest” from developers, responses to which were due Feb. 15. An evaluation panel is in the process of poring over the submissions and will select a “short list” of development teams that will be invited to submit more detailed proposals. The city plans to announce the winning team by late spring or summer.
It’s familiar territory. Plans to rebuild the aging ballpark have been bouncing around City Hall since 2001. But this time there’s a difference: Instead of playing defense, responding to private developers and outside proposals to relocate the baseball stadium (Shockoe Bottom, Mayo Island, next to the Federal Reserve Bank downtown), city planners are now driving the process.
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On the heels of the bungled Navy Hill project, the proposed $1.5 billion city center development led by the late Thomas F. Farrell, former president and CEO of Dominion Energy, the Diamond District represents something of a departure. Unlike Navy Hill, shepherded by Farrell and the business community, the city developed its vision for the 67 acres before seeking out private developers.
“People have asked, ‘How is this different?’ ” says Maritza Mercado Pechin, deputy director in the city’s Department of Planning and Development Review. The answer is in the master plan. “We’ve done community engagement. We knew this was coming. We said this is what we’re going to do. The master plan said we’re going to follow these steps.”
Taking ownership of the stadium and prepping the surrounding parcels has given the city considerable leverage. Sixty-seven acres of undeveloped land, surrounded by thousands of new apartments and rising property values just off the interstate, make the property strikingly attractive to real estate developers.
“I think it offers a great opportunity,” says Danny Coffman, director of investments and capital markets with Weller Development Co., based in Baltimore. He made the trek to Richmond for the Diamond District tour, and he sees similarities with Weller’s massive Port Covington project, a 235-acre mixed-use development off the Patapsco River near I-95 in Baltimore.
“We view this site much in the same way that we view the Port Covington site, an opportunity to create a place with high-density mixed-use, retail,” he says. “And then you expand out from there with the addition of a hotel, with the addition of an entertainment center and then, eventually, a stadium.”
For all the excitement, there’s still a big hurdle — namely, who will foot the bill for the new ballpark?
A new stadium is expected to cost at least $80 million, according to a feasibility study conducted by AECOM, an infrastructure consulting firm. Sports arenas and ballparks are expensive, single-use facilities that sit unused for long stretches, which makes them financially unsustainable on their own. A new ballpark for the Squirrels will require public financing, which the city acknowledges in its RFI. Sledge says the goal is to “absolutely minimize public investment.”
Would the city create a tax-increment financing (TIF) district, which diverts tax revenues generated within a defined area to pay for the ballpark, or a community development authority, which does something similar? Will regional partners chip in?
Attracting regional support could be difficult. Chesterfield and Henrico counties have largely balked in the past when it came to financing a new stadium.
John Vithoulkas, Henrico County manager, says his door is open, but he hasn’t had any discussions with city officials about the current plan. “Henrico has always found a way to get to ‘yes’ on regional efforts,” Vithoulkas says.
Chris Winslow, chairman of the Chesterfield County Board of Supervisors, says the county also hasn’t had recent discussions with the city, but is “always open to a conversation with our friends on City Council.”
Financing the ballpark, with or without regional help, will almost certainly require a substantial investment from city taxpayers, says John Gerner, a Richmond-based consultant who served as vice chairman of the City Council-appointed Navy Hill Development Advisory Commission, which analyzed the Navy Hill project. The simplest way to pay for it, he says, is through a TIF district, which means using some portion of future tax revenues generated by the new development — and likely surrounding, preexisting properties — to pay off the bonds needed for the new stadium.
“Right now, from everything I’ve seen, the financing is just vague,” Gerner says. “The city doesn’t have $80 million. The cleanest, fastest way to do this is the same way they were going to do Navy Hill. … But we don’t know until we get these proposals.”
