Rays' respond to traffic and parking concerns

As expected, the Rays have transmitted a response to the city's parking and traffic concerns. In short:

• The Rays consultant continues to feel it is not necessary to construct a 3,500-space parking garage.
• And the team got two new letters of interest from private companies that the Rays say could generate an additional 4,000-to-5,000 parking spaces for baseball.
• In particular, the downtown Hilton said it would "seriously consider" building a multi-story parking garage at its facility if the Rays' plans are approved.

Read the report for yourself here (There's much discussion about how far people are willing to walk to the game).

So I went for a walk this afternoon ...

So I decided to go for a walk today after lunch. And as I was walking, I decided to test the Rays' parking circle map that's shown above. I walked to the Coliseum (It's marked on this map by the green lot right at the edge of I-375) and decided to time my walk to the new stadium.

By the Rays' math, it should be at a maximum 25 minutes. I started west on 5th Avenue N and  crisscrossed to Al Lang based on the walk signs I hit at each intersection. Near BayWalk, I stopped for a minute to take a call on my cell phone, and also hit the ATM.

I didn't walk fast, but I did work up a bit of a sweat in the afternoon sun. Anyway, the total walk took me between 16 and 17 minutes. I then walked back to the Times' offices, which is on First Avenue S and Fourth Street. The Rays' map suggests that walk should take between 10 and 15 minutes. It took me five minutes.

BIG NOTE: Before anyone decides to jump all over me, I'm not saying the experience of me is in any way "proof" people will walk from the Coliseum or other points more than 1/2 mile from the stadium. Maybe I walk faster than most people, or maybe I'm in better health. I don't know. I just thought it was interesting, and worth sharing.

City officials, as you may recall, have said that the Rays cannot count any parking spaces more than 1/2 a mile from the stadium as part of their potential inventory. (That's all of the spaces beyond the second circle).

Fans for Waterfront Stadium parking slideshow

The pro-stadium group Fans For Waterfront Stadium today released a Power Point slideshow meant to allay some of the parking concerns associated with a new ballpark. The slideshow was created from photos taken during the Sunday running of the Honda Grand Prix of St. Petersburg, when city leaders estimated 50-to-75,000 people were at the race downtown.

Fans For Waterfront Stadium says the slideshow is evidence that plenty of parking potentially exists downtown to accommodate a 34,000-seat ballpark.

Make up your own mind. View the slideshow (if you have Power Point on your computer) here.