I first visited Safeco Field in 2001, during the Mariners’ 116-win season. The place was hopping back then the way it hasn’t since. When I planned this trip to Seattle I didn’t expect much. The M’s had the Brewers in town, so I wasn’t expecting thrilling baseball by playoff contenders. I looked closer at the schedule and found out that I was in for a treat. Saturday was Ken Griffey Jr.’s induction into the Mariners Hall of Fame, and there was to be an extensive pregame ceremony commemorating the event. There was also a Junior bobblehead, which was to be distributed to the first 20,000 fans (very A’s like number there), which forced many fans to line up six hours or more before the scheduled 6:10 game time. Needless to say I wasn’t interested in the collectible, so I took a tour and grabbed lunch instead.

View of Safeco Field near light rail station across 4th Avenue South (Stadium Station)

During that first visit in 2001, I took a cab down 4th Avenue South from a downtown restaurant. The cab dropped me off on the east side of the railroad tracks from Safeco Field. Like many had done, I crossed the tracks at grade, looking both ways for freight or passenger trains. At the time local planners were working on a light rail extension that would finally link downtown and the neighborhoods to the south, including the SeaTac airport. The line finally came to fruition in 2009 and I was eager to try it out.

In conjunction with the light rail launch, additional road infrastructure was built to better support cars and pedestrians traveling to Safeco and CenturyLink Field. 2010 brought the Royal Brougham Way overpass, a simple two-lane structure that feeds pedestrians from light rail and parking facilities to Safeco and cars to a nearby garage. This overpass and another on the south side of the ballpark were part of an $84 million road project. During the intervening years, four pedestrians had been hit by trains on the BNSF tracks adjacent to Safeco, including one fatality. Naturally, ongoing safety concerns prompted the overpass(es) project, to good effect.

Royal Brougham Way overpass runs elevated behind Safeco Field roof support and curls around before rejoining street grid. At grade access was eliminated.

Like Seattle, Oakland’s Howard Terminal has an active, working rail line adjacent to the site. We’ve highlighted the train safety issue before. Seattle has dealt with the problem properly and elegantly, if also rather belatedly in the process. When you exit the light rail station just two blocks to the east, you can easily negotiate the gently curling ramp that leads over the BNSF tracks. There’s even a little plaza at the midpoint that provides a good view into the park. Once you cross, you can take stairs down or take an elevator straight to the center field gate.

West end of sidewalk drops down to grade via stairs or an elevator immediately next to center field gate. Vehicle ramp is visible to the right.

Unlike Seattle, where Safeco is in the middle of the street grid with multiple entry and exit points, Howard Terminal is hemmed in on three sides by the Oakland Estuary to the south, Jack London Square to the east, and Schnitzer Steel to the west. That means it’s extremely important to ensure that there’s safe, reliable way to get thousands of fans from the north side of the Union Pacific tracks along the Embarcadero to the south side, where HT and JLS are. If thousands of parking spaces or a garage are built at Howard Terminal, it’ll be even more important as no one will want to compromise the rail line by having cars create gridlock around HT before or after A’s games. Chances are that a HT ballpark will need one vehicular bridge (probably at Market Street) and another dedicated pedestrian/bicycle bridge near JLS.

As you can see from the video above, the solution is working. It may have taken a decade, but Seattle finally got its rail and pedestrian solution figured out. Oakland can thank Seattle for leading the way. Stadium name sponsor Safeco, a nationwide insurance company based in Seattle, probably abides too. The issues for Oakland – if Howard Terminal moves into a real planning stage – are what kind of solution they can come up with, how much it will cost, and how long it will take. Seattle set the example. Oakland fans deserve the same kind of safety.

If you’re still skeptical, ask yourself this: Can you imagine the Coliseum without the BART bridge?

Before I begin, I feel I need to make something clear.

There is no such thing as a perfect ballpark.

Our very perception of a ballpark is framed in terms of quirks, imperfections, and uniqueness. We can go on and on talking about how the experience at one was wonderful or breathtaking, and in a particular moment with the right weather or a great team, it may well seem perfect.

It’s not.

As we know from merely watching the game, one game is a ridiculously small sample size. If I had the time and money, I’d spend at least one homestand at every park just so that I can get the feel for it. The nooks and crannies, the neighborhood outside, day and night games, weekdays and weekends. One game provides a pretty small subset of those variables. Knowing that makes me reticent to judge a ballpark based on one game.

Home Plate Gate at PNC Park

This is why I like to take ballpark and stadium tours. They allow for the opportunity to strip away much of the game fervor (or lack thereof), which can boost or mar an experience without the observer realizing it. I can take in much of the trivial minutiae from the tour guides while filtering out the occasional rah-rah bombast. My mind can turn towards the technical matters, the details that often get lost during a game.

When I took a business trip to Pittsburgh a few weeks ago, I had just missed the A’s visit to PNC Park. As a result I couldn’t take in a game with the Pirates on the road. I did have a lunchtime slot for a 90-minute tour before an appointment, so I drove over to the North Shore for a visit. I had seen a game there in 2001, the park’s inaugural year. At the time the place had only been open for a few weeks, and I was eager to see this shiny, new, yet undoubtedly retro ballpark. I was so eager back then that I had mistakenly locked the keys to my rental car in the car. After a blissful afternoon in the right field bleachers, the Allegheny River rolling behind me, I spent a highly stressful hour trying to get the keys out, and then upon giving up, calling the rental car company to report that I was abandoning the car. I hailed a cab for the airport and hadn’t been back until this most recent trip.

View of home plate from LF corner

Trying to block out the car crisis, what I remember about PNC Park was that it was the friendliest park I had been to, more than even Wrigley. When I took my seat in RF, the usher directed my down to the seat, took a towel, and brushed it off. I would’ve given him a tip except that I was shocked I didn’t know how to react other than to give a polite thank you.

The seats and steelwork at PNC Park are deep blue, a nod to the Pirates’ ancestral home, Forbes Field. One of the first concrete-and-steel ballparks, Forbes only grew in stature as the Pirates moved into cavernous Three Rivers Stadium. Baseball at Three Rivers was the archetypical cookie-cutter experience: Astroturf, bad seating angles, and a fully encompassing upper deck that killed views. Despite a decent amount of success on the field, the team frequently struggled at the gate, leading many to wonder if the market could fully support the team in the long run.

View of Downtown Pittsburgh from LF corner

The Pirates were saved when legislation was passed to build two separate, new stadia for the baseball club and the Steelers. PNC Park opened first in the spring of 2001, Heinz Field followed in the fall. Three Rivers is now a parking lot serving the two stadia. Both are reachable by one of the many bridges that cross the Allegheny River. You could park along the North Shore for a game, but you’d be best served parking downtown and taking in the approach to the ballpark by walking across the Roberto Clemente Bridge. You’ll end up in centerfield, where you can walk along the river or check out the bars and restaurants along Federal Street.

12 years after my first visit, PNC has maintained its handsomeness. The tan limestone facade still looks lovely. Walk in the main gate behind home plate or at third base/left field and you’re greeted a sweeping, octagonal rotunda. For years teams have struggled to figure out how to integrate vertical circulation, and HOK managed to make it a feature at PNC. The rotunda in LF also acts a nice standing room vantage point for a game, regardless of level.

Panorama from press box

The third base gate is also called Legacy Square and is worth a visit because of the numerous tributes to great Negro League players like Josh Gibson, Satchel Paige, and one-time Athletic James “Cool Papa” Bell. Pittsburgh was once home to two great Negro League teams, the Pittsburgh Crawfords and the Homestead Grays. A team store stands alongside. The outfield concourse is at street level, while the main lower concourse is up a level. Take the rotunda ramp, you’ll enjoy it.

Walk along the main grandstand and you’ll notice that there are no obstructions. There’s no press box behind the plate and no suites or other stands that could block the view. All of the suites are set in their own mezzanine level, and the press box is way up at the top of the upper deck, a situation that many a media wonk have groused about over the years. Despite their complaints, it’s hard to argue that this isn’t the best layout in the majors. It’s the simplest, the cleanest, and most importantly, the shortest of the new ballparks. There are two club seating levels, but only one true club concourse. The tallest row is only 88 feet above the field.

Lounge area of Pittsburgh Baseball Club down 3B line

PNC Park is also the only “two-deck” ballpark of the last 25 years, though the term is somewhat deceiving. The front part of the upper deck is the exclusive Pittsburgh Baseball Club seating area, taking up the first 10 rows. The back 20+ rows are the true upper level and have a separate, regular concourse. The advantage of this layout is the aforementioned vertical space conservation. However, because of the limited cantilever (13-14 rows or 40 feet), the upper deck is somewhat swept back instead of on top of the action. The park was built before the advent of the split deck-single concourse layout, so there are no views of the action from the upper concourse. PBC has views from patio areas carved out where seating sections would normally be. The roof is simple and more ornamental than practical.

Suites in the mezzanine, press box up top

Sure, the press got the short shrift when PNC Park was built. Most press levels are only around 50 above the field and 130-140 feet behind home plate, making for an enviable, cozy view of everything. Recently teams such as the Angels have started to move the writing media to not-so-optimal locations. As more teams look for additional premium spaces to sell within their parks, expect this trend to continue. It’s a reflection of a much larger trend in the NFL, where the media is often relegated to a corner while the space usually reserved at midfield is offered up as a handful of ultra-premium suites. The 2011 renderings of Cisco Field indicated that the PNC or Nationals Park examples would be followed, with the press level(s) up top.

Legacy Square with rotunda in background

Because of its 2001 opening date and its scenic waterfront locale, PNC often gets compared to AT&T Park, which stands to reason. Both are highly rated HOK products. Both have the water along the right field wall. Both have 68-69 luxury suites and about 6,000 club seats. That’s where the similarities end.

In Pittsburgh, a decision was made to have the facade run right up to the sidewalk at home plate, with the home plate rotunda immediately inside. A small plaza at the corner has a Honus Wagner statue. That’s a very different approach from San Francisco, where the expansive Willie Mays Plaza greets fans before funneling them through the gates and onto ramps or escalators. Personally, I like the PNC Park approach more because it feels more complete. The vertical circulation elements at AT&T are little more than an afterthought, serviceable but ugly, a byproduct of the limited footprint. (Yes, I said something at China Basin was ugly.)

Batting cage adjacent to Pirates’ clubhouse. Turf shown comes from Three Rivers Stadium

The color scheme at PNC is also better. I had misgivings about the dark blue seats fading over time, but that hasn’t happened at all about halfway through their useful life. The green seats at AT&T are copycat and not true to the team’s colors, though the Giants can be forgiven for not using a garish orange for their seats.

That brings me to the biggest advantage of PNC. Essentially, there are zero compromised seats. Notice that didn’t say “bad” seats, as that term often gets tossed around with little regard for what it means. What I mean is that every seat has a great view of the entire playing field. As you’d expect, there are no obstructed view seats – and every seat in the main bowl has a great view of the Pittsburgh skyline. The comparison is more fundamental than that. At PNC the left field corner is turned at a 45-degree angle, which ensures that fans there will be able to see all of the field. Compare that to the LF corner upper deck at AT&T, which has a great view of home plate but is practically blind to most of the outfield. Again, this was probably decision made because of limited space (and the desire to cram in as many seats as possible). In the end it’s an inelegant solution, one that HOK/Populous did not repeat anywhere else since. Thank goodness for that.

Pirates dugout

AT&T Park originally cost $100 million more than PNC Park to construct despite having only 2,000 more seats. Where did the money go? Two separate club levels, for starters. There’s a lot more finished space at AT&T, more concrete, and the foundation was more expensive due to seismic concerns.

AT&T has its own advantages over PNC. It’s 100 feet closer to the water down the right field line. AT&T’s outfield design is much more iconic and interesting and the beer selections there are slightly better. AT&T also didn’t set the “moat” trend of separating the field club seats from the regular field level seats as PNC Park. (In PNC’s defense, at least the moat is accessible.) That said, AT&T Park is less intimate, not as good looking, is more blatantly commercial, and the main seating bowl arrangement is way too much like Minute Maid Park’s (or most other HOK designs) for me to call it unique or interesting. Neither park has an aggressive cantilever many baseball purists desire.

Both Pirates fans and Giants fans can easily make the case that their ballpark is the best among the new regime. They are. If I’m going to pick one, it’d be PNC for the reasons described above. There’s no shame in using PNC as the model for a new A’s ballpark in Oakland. It’s a standard bearer, even if it’s not perfect.

I should go, see you in June – Smashing Pumpkins, “Rhinoceros”

Chicago skyline from Gate 5 at U.S. Cellular Field

As a born-and-bred West Coast, California kid, I gleefully admit to my various friends my general ignorance about other climates around North America. Many of my friends are transplants who casually talk about missing seasons while secretly celebrating not needing air conditioning (or much heating) where they currently live in the Bay Area. I’m smug and glib about it, I know. So it’s those times when I go out of my comfort zone that I learn a lot more about baseball and the way it’s enjoyed in other parts of the country.

Midwesterners tell me all the time about weird summer weather and turning leaves. None of it is a good substitute for me experiencing that weather. So it was with a little disappointment that I learned just prior to this weekend’s Chicago trip that the weather would be mostly overcast or partly sunny during the day with highs in the upper-60’s/low-70’s, lows in the low-50’s. I thought to myself, That’s the weather I’m USED to, I didn’t bargain for this. Rain would not be a factor in any of the five games on my slate, with only a tease of thunderstorms on the way in and out of Chicago. Alas.

View from my seat of Wrigley Field grandstand. Ramps and fence behind grandstand are visible.

Still, since I was in the area four days, there was time to experience the game at a less rushed pace. Friday was the big doubleheader, a 1:20 game on the North Side and a 7:10 tilt on the South Side. I went to the Cubs game solo and the A’s-White Sox game with Zonis, who lent me a day parking pass for his street just three blocks from Wrigley Field. I had been so used to taking the El up to Wrigley Field that I wanted a different experience, and there was no way I would pass this up. Safe navigation to Zonis’s house completed and after a chat with the young man and his dad (they had just completed their own mini ballpark trip to Milwaukee and Beloit), I walked out of Zonis’s house and started the three block walk.

Vinyl covered exterior seems loud, no?

Then I heard it. The pregame organ. It’s a siren song to the residents of the neighborhood, telling everyone that’s okay to come out and play, to cut school or work, to enjoy a day at the yard. It’s something that often gets ignored coming from the Addison Red Line station because of train and crowd noise. In the comparatively tranquil setting of the Lakeview neighborhood, the organ made me feel like I was already there, that the neighborhood was a big theme park where all the streets would eventually lead me to Wrigley. No other urban ballpark is as integrated to its environs as Wrigley Field is. Fenway comes second at night when it turns into Red Sox game mode, but Wrigley really shines for these day games, making Fenway a distant second. Nothing else comes close, because of the way new ballparks are designed to be insular.

Wrigley Field exterior along Addison Street

Wrigley famously has very little façade. Behind home plate is the light gray concrete structure accented by green and the distinctive red marquee. It’s not brick or sandstone, and there’s little to write home about. At some point recently the Cubs decided to have huge vinyl signs of the players cover up much of the concrete, as many newer parks have done. As much as I appreciate the blast of color, I miss the old humble concrete. Along the first and third baselines are chain link fences, so the back of each deck is exposed to the street it faces. Narrow ramps and corridors fill some of the space along the fences, creating numerous places for fans to stand. The back of the lower deck is also a great place to catch some sun, especially if you don’t have the gift of a sun-kissed seat close to the field (or the bleachers for that matter). One of the downsides of the open back is the lack of wind buffeting. Throughout the back of the grandstand the wind has a tendency to swirl, whereas close to the field the conditions are downright placid. An open back design would never pass muster in the current era. Potential neighbors would complain about the lack of noise insulation that a façade and other elements provide. Owners and architects would push for a design with more heft, and that requires a façade whether it’s stone, brick, or glass.

Gate 5 at U.S. Cellular Field is separated from the ballpark by 35th Street. Fans who enter here use footbridges to enter ballpark.

I had a seat in section/aisle 223, row 27, which had me hopelessly stuck under the upper deck overhang with a column in plain view (but not obstructing). As the winds swirled around and brought the shade temperature down to the mid-50’s, my jacket-less and goosebump-ridden self started to look for ways to warm. The back of the lower deck was nice option. Wrigley’s compact design and unique network of ramps makes it easy to move among the decks. There’s only one concourse at street level, beneath the 200-level seats on the lower deck. I made my typical shutterbug walk in the 4th inning to capture as much with my camera as I could.

The true beauty of Wrigley reveals itself best when emerging from one of the tunnels in either the left or right field corners. Up a long stairway, suddenly you’re among the lucky sun-drenched fans. Ferris Bueller and his friends made the LF corner idyllic, whereas Steve Bartman made it notorious. You go there and then you figure out ways to stay there forever. As the shadows move during the game, those further away from the field down the 3B line get their sun taken away, a cruel tease.

View of home plate from my seat at Wrigley Field

Old Comiskey Park was even worse from a sun standpoint. The upper deck was only 16 rows from the field in foul territory, and completely hung over the lower deck in fair territory. While Wrigley was “wide open” behind the lower deck, Comiskey had windows to let some natural light in. Nevertheless, Comiskey’s reputation was always darker and more foreboding, an image owed to numerous factors such as the South Side location, the catacomb bullpens, and the generally darker, danker atmosphere.

View of home plate from my seat at U.S. Cellular Field (night game)

Knowing what Sox fans had experienced for decades, Sox owner Jerry Reinsdorf would give fans coming to the new Comiskey Park (nee U.S. Cellular Field) a much sunnier, wide open experience. The suite/upper deck cantilever is only a few rows above the back of the lower deck. Initially there was only a small roof covering the upper rows the upper deck. With a modern design derived from Kansas City’s Royals Stadium, New Comiskey was to be the more family-friendly albeit less intimate experience. Ramps were well removed from the concourse, especially the ones on the 3B side (across 35th Street). Escalators brought fans to their exclusive levels on three seating levels, with no way for fans to move from one level to another without proper admission. Seating sections were narrow to provide better access. The outfield seats were a single level, fully exposed like the Wrigley bleachers, and had full concessions plus a huge concourse. Enormous scoreboards and a video board were placed along the outfield, blocking much of the view of the less-than-desirable neighborhood to the southeast.

Upper concourse at U.S. Cellular Field

The upper deck concourse was also exposed, with only the tall seating bowl providing protection from the elements. That was changed in the 2004 renovations, when the concourse enclosed with translucent windows providing natural light. The Gate 3 ramps provided gorgeous views of The Loop, but the ballpark was built in the era before recognizing skylines, so New Comiskey turned its back to the city. Reinsdorf eventually reduced the park’s capacity while introducing touches reminiscent of Old Comiskey, such as the more extensive roof.

And so we have the starkest contrasts in ballpark building (multipurpose stadia don’t count as ballparks per se), mere minutes from each other on the Red Line. There’s “The Cell” with its hulking, seemingly impenetrable concrete edifice, and Wrigley, where the boundary between the ballpark and its neighborhood almost doesn’t exist. The former advances sun at the expense of intimacy, the latter brought intimacy well before anyone cared to consider ballparks as intimate or not intimate. We’ve seen the era of multipurpose stadia rise and fall, to be replaced by retro ballparks that feign intimacy while providing virtue for sun-seekers. It’s a summer sport, and in a place where summer really exists for only three months, we’ve seen owners and fans take great care to appreciate every bit of summer they can get. While Californians take summer for granted, those in the Continental climate savor it just a little more than we do. Therefore I can’t blame new ballparks like The Cell or Comerica for not being intimate. They’re just trying to give as much summer to as many fans as they can bring into the ballpark. As much as I prefer an aggressive cantilever to bring upper deck fans closer, I can see the argument against it. It took a trip to Chicago to fully understand the dilemma.