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New plans for a Tampa Bay Rays stadium have been revealed by their developer, the Tampa Bay Times reports. They are the privately developed plans of Darryl LeClair and CityScape, and not neccessarily something the Rays are interested in. "Rays Park at Carillon" is the name of the project, and it proposes development of a stadium, office buildings, retail stores, apartments and a hotel on a triangle of land between Ulmerton Road, Roosevelent Boulevard and Interstate 275.
Rays Vice President Michael Kalt, who attended the presentation, did not give comment as to the team's position on the proposal. The team's position has been that they would like to consider the larger Tampa Bay area in any discussion of a new stadium, and not just the St. Petersburg area.
The proposed stadium would seat 35,000 people, be air conditioned, and could have a transparent roof and rear wall made from the clear plastic that was used in the construction of the Water Cube at the 2008 Beijing Olympics. The estimated cost for the project is $540-570 million, including land an infrastructure. Proposals for funding include rolling over the one percent hotel tax that currently funds the Trop, sale of the land the Trop currently occupies, and money from the Rays. That still leaves a substantial gap in funding.
Other questions that remain concern parking around the proposed stadium as well as traffic for fans traveling to games from the surrounding area.