Worcester Business Journal

14 2020 Economic Forecast • Worcester Business Journal • www.wbjournal.com We're in business to help your business. Let's start with a suite of tools that can make your business flow more smoothly. That means more time for you to do what you do best - run your business! We're local and we're experienced. We have the tools to accelerate your success. From equipment finance 1 to real estate, from short- term credit 2 to funding for raw materials and production factors - look to People's United Bank. Let's talk. ©2019 People's United Bank, N.A. | Member FDIC | Equal Housing Lender There's only one way to run your business. Your way. David Eidle SVP, Business Banking Team Leader 978-624-1088 | david.eidle@peoples.com 1 Equipment financing provided through People's Capital & Leasing , a wholly-owned subsidiary of People's United Bank. All credit applications are subject to credit approval. 2 Subject to application and credit approval. To p Wo rc e s t e r R e d S ox s t o r i e s i n 2 0 1 9 Continued from Page 13 lion to acquire all necessary properties. The City of Worcester and Boston developer Madison Properties filed the long-awaited plans for the $101-million Polar Park baseball stadium in September, along with a bevy of mixed- use properties in the Canal District. The filings are the first official plans filed with the city by the Worcester Redevelopment Authority and Madison Properties and come more than a year after the minor league Pawtucket Red Sox and city announced the $240-mil- lion Canal District redevelopment plan to be built around the team's new home. The ballpark will have a capacity of 10,000 people with home plate situated closer to Madison Street and centerfield overlooking Plymouth Street. Plans show a main seating area in the infield, other less traditional seating options in the outfield and a Worcester Wall in right field. A three-story building will form the western edge of the pedestrian entrance into the concourse-level courtyard behind home plate, featuring meeting rooms, restaurants, suites, function rooms, a pedestrian promenade, play areas, retail space and a team store. The $16-million Kelley Square recon- struction project started in October. The project will direct traffic into a sort of two-ended roundabout with two travel lanes, which has been called a peanut design for its shape when viewed from the air. Other planned changes include reversing the direction of travel for two streets, making Millbury Street one-way southbound, and making Harding Street northbound for the stretch south of Kelley Square. >> Worcester Red Sox unveil nickname, logo When the minor league baseball team Pawtucket Red Sox leave their Rhode Island home for Massachusetts for the 2021 season, their nickname will offi- cially be WooSox. It was standing room only in Mercantile Center lobby just before Thanksgiving in Worcester as Red Sox fans joined team executives to eat hot dogs and Table Talk pies and learn the team's nickname. Even Worcester Red Sox President Charles Steinberg admitted the whole thing was anti-climatic. "More than 1,000 people sent in 218 suggestions with names like the Rockets, the Dirt Dogs, the Gritty Kitties, and even one from Holy Cross, the Holy Sox, but what beats the WooSox?" he asked the crowd. The answer came back a resounding "Nothing." With that, the team's new logo of a smiley face in a baseball cap was unveiled to shouts of "Woo, Woo, Woo." The team already had established previously Worcester Red Sox would be its official name, Steinberg told WBJ after the event. The WooSox nickname will be used on second reference, simi- lar to how PawSox is used as its nick- name now, which differentiates it from its major league counterpart in Boston. In November 2018, the Triple A minor league baseball affiliate launched an interactive promotion offering fans the chance to name the team after its move to a new $101-million municipal stadium in the Canal District. Team officials even went as far as saying the team might not choose to include Red Sox in the official name, although that turned out to not be the case. At the naming announcement, WooSox Chairman and Co-owner Larry Lucchino, 74, said he's excited about the choice of Worcester for the team's new stadium, which will be named Polar Park and be built by the City of Worcester. He said at least 18 cities made the pitch for the team, including Springfield and Weymouth. "We are happy to find a place where we were really wanted," he told the WBJ. "Worcester is the right place. They did it the right way with a spirit of col- laboration that continues to this day." Former Boston Red Sox catcher Rich Gedman, 60, a Worcester native and graduate of St. Peter-Marian High School in Worcester, told the audience he was a thrill to be back in his home- town where so many of his early base- ball memories were made. Janet Marie Smith, who oversaw the $285-million renovation of Boston's Fenway Park in 2012 and is now man- aging the $100-million renovation of Dodger Stadium for the Los Angeles Dodgers, said she worked with the architect to design Polar Park for Worcester's Canal District. "We worked hard to keep the park unique by working with the environ- ment we found," Smith said. The WooSox nickname and logo were unveiled in a public ceremony in November. P H O T O / T H O M A S G R I L L O

• Cover