Arlington posters

[GreenMonster]

Has there been any visible progress towards the new Cowboys stadium? Just wondering.

[DU_stud04]

visible progress? well, theyve cleared all the old apartments and leveled aot of the businesses, everythings flat but i cant tell anything that they've started to acctually build. i cant wait till it is build. one thing i know, im staying away from that place during games....its bad enough when a rangers game is going on.

[DU_stud04]

saw this in the paper a few weeks ago.




New stadium a flurry of labor

Arlington: Cowboys' palatial home is right on track, builder says

12:00 AM CDT on Sunday, June 4, 2006

By JEFF MOSIER / The Dallas Morning News

ARLINGTON – Two stories below ground, the new home of the Dallas Cowboys is taking shape.

For every minute of the workday, a truck filled with red dirt enters or exits the central Arlington construction site. When the digging is finished in September, workers will start building upward from the bottom of a 50-foot-deep bowl and gradually turn the former neighborhood into a 75,000-seat football palace.

"It's humbling," said construction manager Jack Hill, standing along the future concourse.

He's worked on the construction of Ameriquest Field and American Airlines Center, but neither can compare to this, he said.

Just a few months into a three-year, $650 million construction cycle, Mr. Hill said the dry weather has kept work on schedule. The unnamed stadium will open for the 2009 football season.

For the entire summer, more than 40 trucks will make trip after trip, hauling 750,000 cubic yards of dirt to road construction sites in Tarrant and Dallas counties. Sanford Street has turned a dusty red from constant caravans.

About the same amount, much of it gray shale churned up by massive paddle wheel scrapers, is being redistributed within the 158-acre stadium site.

Although it now looks like a giant pit ringed with retaining walls, Mr. Hill can point to future landmarks. The roadbed is being created for an extension of Rogers Road, and the scrapers enter the bowl through a future end zone. He can even point to the approximate site of one of the goal posts.

"We're exactly where we need to be," Mr. Hill said.

The city of Arlington, which is responsible for acquiring land for the stadium, is finishing one of the most contentious parts of the projects.

City officials have only a couple of properties left to purchase for parking.

At least three people whose homes were razed are suing the city for its use of eminent domain to take land for the stadium. Those cases aren't scheduled for trial until next year.

More land to buy

Roger Venables, Arlington's real estate manager, said he doesn't expect trouble with the last few property owners. He has an agreement to buy a Bank of America branch at Collins Street and Randol Mill Road.

Also, negotiations were proceeding with the three owners of the VIP motel and surrounding land on Division Street, he said.

Once those are done, $70 million in land purchases will be complete. That's slightly more than city officials expected, but they are also using less land. Previously, they estimated it would require about 200 acres, but they decided not to purchase some land along Collins and Division streets, including a mobile home park.

Mr. Venables said the amount of land needed was recalculated once the stadium design was further along.

Although most of the design has been completed by Dallas-based HKS Architects, it probably won't be publicized until late fall, Cowboys spokesman Brett Daniels said.

While dirt is flying in Arlington, developers more than 1,000 miles away are finalizing plans for an adjacent project that will cost nearly as much as the football stadium.

Steiner and Associates, based in Columbus, Ohio, is working on the 70-acre, $600 million Glorypark development.

A design and cost estimate is being prepared for the 1.2 million square feet of retail space, as well as office and residential space, sandwiched between Ameriquest Field and the Cowboys stadium.

Much of the Glorypark land is currently Rangers parking. To compensate, the two sports teams will share parking and use parking garages planned for Glorypark.

Town-center design

Although the design isn't complete, an artist rendering resembles Southlake Town Square, Legacy Town Center in Plano and other new urbanism projects.

Steiner officials unveiled the project to retailers at the International Council of Shopping Centers convention in Las Vegas late last month.

"The project generated a bunch of excitement for the scale and the location," said Ralph Ireland, a senior vice president for Steiner.

A completed design should be released to the public in the next several months.

Glorypark is scheduled to open in fall 2008, about a year before the Cowboys begin playing in Arlington.

This is the type of major project many Arlington residents expected when the Rangers' ball field opened 12 years ago, but there has been little development around the stadium.

While the stadiums were nice selling points for Glorypark, Mr. Ireland said, the crucial factor in the development was plans for an $800 million expansion of Interstate 30 through Arlington and upgrades to the bridges and exits.

"If that wasn't happening, this project wouldn't be feasible," he said.

The "Three Bridges" project includes new interchanges or bridges at Collins and Center streets and Baird Farm Road, which will be extended into the stadium area. The state estimates that the project will be completed by September 2009, just in time for the Cowboys' first season in Arlington.

[Adidas410s]

Originally posted by DU_stud04
visible progress? well, theyve cleared all the old apartments and leveled aot of the businesses, everythings flat but i cant tell anything that they've started to acctually build. i cant wait till it is build. one thing i know, im staying away from that place during games....its bad enough when a rangers game is going on.

Yeah...traffic is horrid on a weeknight with 25-30k fans at the ballpark...I can't imagine what it will be like with 75k (expandable to 100k) people are at Jerryland come 2009. Sure hope I don't move any closer to Arlington! :(

[DU_stud04]

Originally posted by Adidas410s
Yeah...traffic is horrid on a weeknight with 25-30k fans at the ballpark...I can't imagine what it will be like with 75k (expandable to 100k) people are at Jerryland come 2009. Sure hope I don't move any closer to Arlington! :(

im wouldnt be suprised if traffic backed up all the way to 183 past irving.... 360 is terrible. a direct freeway to the stadium would be awesome.

[3afan]

Originally posted by Adidas410s
Yeah...traffic is horrid on a weeknight with 25-30k fans at the ballpark...I can't imagine what it will be like with 75k (expandable to 100k) people are at Jerryland come 2009. Sure hope I don't move any closer to Arlington! :(

it'll only be 10 days a year and mostly on Sundays ....