A LITTLE VISION GOES A LONG WAY
'Twas a time when the people who work in the New Britain Rock Cats' press box would get excited when lines of cars and people began to congregate in the Willow Brook Park lot to attend a ballgame.
It became a pregame ritual with scoreboard operator Larry Michaels and I. We analyzed to the point where we knew that when they began parking cars beyond right field, the attendance would be about 3,500. When cars started filling up the crushed-stone lot adjacent to left field, we were up over 4,500.
Our ritual has faded away because rare is the game when the Rock Cats don't draw more than 3,500. A string of cars extending along the south border of the parking lot and streams of "walk-ups" have become a regular occurrence. The Rock Cats, barring horrible weather May 29-31, will surpass 100,000 for the season.
Think about that. From 1984-1988, the New Britain Red Sox couldn't attain that milestone for the whole season. The quickest the team has reached the century mark was last season in 23 dates. This year, they will do it in either 21 or 22, again barring bad weather.
People are flocking to New Britain Stadium as trips to big league venues become dearer and dearer from a financial standpoint. The entertainment value provides as good a bang for your buck as any outfit seeking your leisure-time attention in the state.
The Rock Cats came into Sunday's homestand finale averaging over 4,700 per opening in a stadium that seats 6,146. Last year, they averaged 5,000 per game but remember the heaviest months of interest lie ahead.
The stadium has been sold out six times. The record for April and May is eight and the record for a season is 17, both set last year when the team attracted 328,406 or 5,052 per opening.
A Rock Cats ticket will soon become a premium ticket. No longer will folks be able to come home from work, see that it's 6 p.m. and decide to mozy on over for the first pitch. Rock Cats fans will have to start thinking ahead to make sure seats are available, and expecting to be seated for the first pitch requires planning.
Lines of vehicles can now be seen stretching north on South Main Street toward Ellis Street on busy nights. With the ramp spilling off Route 9 for fans coming in from Middletown and points south, congestion can back up well into the heart of Berlin and beyond.
The Rock Cats have vision for the future. There has been talk of restructuring the left-field wall and building something similar to the "monster" seats that have captivated Fenway-goers. If 8,000 or 9,000 ticets can be sold, they'd like to have the chance.
But is there similar vision on the part of the city? The parking situation has been out of hand since the Bill Dowling-Coleman Levy era began in 2000 with a pattern that causes a bottleneck and procedures that slow the process to a crawl. (Why don't the people who handle the cash wear money belts instead of taking the money, walking back to a table, making change and walking back to the car?)
And if vision comes into play, can we look into a parking garage that sits between the baseball and football venues? I realize that financing is a concern but I sense that forward-thinking politicos should be able to come up with some ideas, or is forward-thinking politicos an oxymoron these days.
Another ever-growing concern is that the Rock Cats' eco-center is Cromwell rather than New Britain. When players, managers, coaches. umpires and out-of-state visitors come out of the Willow Brook lot, they generally take a right instead of coming into the city. But there is little that the city currently has to offer.
Cleaning up the hotel, which is now in the LaQuinta chain, was a huge step in the right direction. And for those who haven't noticed, you can stay at the hotel again. It is no longer the broken-down crime-infested eyesore it once was. And if you haven't had ribs at Famous Dave's Restaurant, you're not paying attention.
Now we need a downtown sports bar and perhaps another comfortable tavern/eatery that complements Famous Dave's. With vision, it can be done, and if anybody needs vision lessons, go see Coleman Levy and Bill Dowling.
It became a pregame ritual with scoreboard operator Larry Michaels and I. We analyzed to the point where we knew that when they began parking cars beyond right field, the attendance would be about 3,500. When cars started filling up the crushed-stone lot adjacent to left field, we were up over 4,500.
Our ritual has faded away because rare is the game when the Rock Cats don't draw more than 3,500. A string of cars extending along the south border of the parking lot and streams of "walk-ups" have become a regular occurrence. The Rock Cats, barring horrible weather May 29-31, will surpass 100,000 for the season.
Think about that. From 1984-1988, the New Britain Red Sox couldn't attain that milestone for the whole season. The quickest the team has reached the century mark was last season in 23 dates. This year, they will do it in either 21 or 22, again barring bad weather.
People are flocking to New Britain Stadium as trips to big league venues become dearer and dearer from a financial standpoint. The entertainment value provides as good a bang for your buck as any outfit seeking your leisure-time attention in the state.
The Rock Cats came into Sunday's homestand finale averaging over 4,700 per opening in a stadium that seats 6,146. Last year, they averaged 5,000 per game but remember the heaviest months of interest lie ahead.
The stadium has been sold out six times. The record for April and May is eight and the record for a season is 17, both set last year when the team attracted 328,406 or 5,052 per opening.
A Rock Cats ticket will soon become a premium ticket. No longer will folks be able to come home from work, see that it's 6 p.m. and decide to mozy on over for the first pitch. Rock Cats fans will have to start thinking ahead to make sure seats are available, and expecting to be seated for the first pitch requires planning.
Lines of vehicles can now be seen stretching north on South Main Street toward Ellis Street on busy nights. With the ramp spilling off Route 9 for fans coming in from Middletown and points south, congestion can back up well into the heart of Berlin and beyond.
The Rock Cats have vision for the future. There has been talk of restructuring the left-field wall and building something similar to the "monster" seats that have captivated Fenway-goers. If 8,000 or 9,000 ticets can be sold, they'd like to have the chance.
But is there similar vision on the part of the city? The parking situation has been out of hand since the Bill Dowling-Coleman Levy era began in 2000 with a pattern that causes a bottleneck and procedures that slow the process to a crawl. (Why don't the people who handle the cash wear money belts instead of taking the money, walking back to a table, making change and walking back to the car?)
And if vision comes into play, can we look into a parking garage that sits between the baseball and football venues? I realize that financing is a concern but I sense that forward-thinking politicos should be able to come up with some ideas, or is forward-thinking politicos an oxymoron these days.
Another ever-growing concern is that the Rock Cats' eco-center is Cromwell rather than New Britain. When players, managers, coaches. umpires and out-of-state visitors come out of the Willow Brook lot, they generally take a right instead of coming into the city. But there is little that the city currently has to offer.
Cleaning up the hotel, which is now in the LaQuinta chain, was a huge step in the right direction. And for those who haven't noticed, you can stay at the hotel again. It is no longer the broken-down crime-infested eyesore it once was. And if you haven't had ribs at Famous Dave's Restaurant, you're not paying attention.
Now we need a downtown sports bar and perhaps another comfortable tavern/eatery that complements Famous Dave's. With vision, it can be done, and if anybody needs vision lessons, go see Coleman Levy and Bill Dowling.
posted by Ken Lipshez at
1:57 PM
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