At the beginning of their two-hour presentation to build a 35,000 seat baseball stadium in the Carillon area of St. Petersburg, Susan Johnson, the Executive Vice President of CityScape LLC, said there were three key questions that needed to be asked and answered.
Does it fit in the tightly enclosed area? And can you park there in the tight 12 undeveloped acres in the Carillon area? Yes and yes again, she answered.
But the final and crucial question: can you pay for it? Nobody has the answer to that at this time.
But even if the ballpark is never built, most observers were extremely impressed by the vastly detailed presentation given to members of the Rays organization, Mayor Bill Foster, the St. Pete City Council, members of the Pinellas County Commission, and several hundred members of the community who filled a large conference room inside the Hilton St. Petersburg Carillion Park Friday afternoon.
Afterwards Mayor Foster said he was "blown away" by the presentation, which CityScape officials said was two years in the making.
This article appears in Sep 27 – Oct 3, 2012.