by Peter Corbett – Nov. 17, 2009 10:02 AM
The Arizona Republic
Baseball will replace a dormant golf course as construction ramps up this week on a $100 million spring training complex for the Arizona Diamondbacks and Colorado Rockies at Salt River.
Team executives and Salt River Pima-Maricopa Indian Community leaders on Monday formally launched the project with a groundbreaking ceremony involving shovels with baseball bat handles.
A $100 million Cactus League stadium and practice facilities will be built over the next 14 months southwest of Loop 101 and Via de Ventura.
“We’re going from a groundbreaking to a ribbon-cutting in a very short time,” said Diamondbacks President Derrick Hall, promising that it will be the best spring-training complex in Major League Baseball.
The Diamondbacks and Rockies agreed earlier this year to leave their individual training facilities in Tucson to be closer to the other 13 Cactus League teams in the Valley.
Salt River is developing the two-team complex, which will include an 11,000-seat stadium, 12 practice fields, two clubhouses, ticket offices and team shops. It will be the nation’s first big league sports facility built on Indian land.
Salt River President Diane Enos said the baseball complex will be a source of revenue, employment and pride for the community.
“Salt River is able to rise to the challenge,” she said.
Baseball fields, batting cages and pitching mounds will replace the Pavilion Lakes Golf Club, an underutilized course between Loop 101 and Pima Road and just north of the Scottsdale Pavilions shopping center.
Final stadium designs have not been completed, but the ballpark will face northeast with sweeping mountain views and plenty of shade for fans in the grandstand.
About 7,000 fixed seats are plannedm along with space for 4,000 fans on grassy berms in the outfield.
The stadium is close to the center of a 140-acre site, with home plate about a half mile north of Indian Bend Road.
The Dallas-based HKS Sports Design Group is completing designs for the stadium, Enos said.
It will be built by Mortenson Construction with cement provided by the Salt River Materials Group, a tribal-owned enterprise.
The stadium work will provide about 100 jobs for the Salt River Materials Group, said Roger Smith Jr., company president.
Diamondbacks chief executive Hall said there will be five points of access for the baseball complex.
Scottsdale is accelerating improvements to Pima Road in the area to accommodate traffic on game days.
There is bus service to Via de Ventura and Pima Road.
Tribal president Enos said there have been discussions about shuttling fans to the stadium on trolleys from Scottsdale Pavilions shopping center and the Talking Stick Resort, which is scheduled to open this spring.
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