Worcester Business Journal

8 Worcester Business Journal | February 22, 2021 | wbjournal.com Park baseball stadium appears likely to be completed by the original April deadline. When the team actually begins play in Worcester will be decided by negotiations between Major League Baseball and the MLB Players Association over the impact of the coronavirus pandemic; and when fans can begin attending games at Polar Park will depend on the Massachusetts regulations on outdoor gatherings, which are currently capped at 25 people. Although the pandemic caused a seven-week shutdown during prime construction season in late spring, Augustus said the direct impact from COVID on the stadium cost was $1.62 million, or about 1% of the total project cost. e city received a $1.5-million reimbursement from the federal CARES Act for this expense. Augustus wrote the pandemic did add indirect and hard- to-measure costs to the project, such as impact on supply chains for materials like lumber, steel and glass. Rough initial estimates e first cost estimate for the project was untenable, Augustus wrote. Before the project was publicly announced, based on the type of stadium the team wanted to build compared to similar stadiums, the cost was estimated to be $73 million, although this was adjusted to $86 million-$90 million in the original August 2018 proposal because the anticipated challenges of the planned site's topography, as the stadium had to be built into a hill with a slope of roughly 18 feet from north to south. "Getting out of the ground is always hardest," said Robert Brehm, a construction engineering professor at Drexel University in Philadelphia, who reviewed Augustus' memo regarding the Polar Park overruns for WBJ. "at site isn't ideal for a ballpark," Brehm said. Augustus said topographic and soil issues on the ballpark footprint itself, along with buying and knocking down commercial buildings standing in the way, were underestimated. In one instance, the city had to pay $6 million to relocate a data center from one of the buildings. B efore announcing their plan in August 2018 to bring the Pawtucket Red Sox minor league baseball team to Worcester, city and team leaders already decided exactly where and when the team would move. A stadium would be built mostly on a hillside parking lot, and where five commercial buildings once stood in the Canal District. e team would start play in its new home in April 2021, since its stadium lease in Pawtucket ended in 2020. ose decisions – where and when – would send both the city and the now renamed Worcester Red Sox down a fast-moving, complicated path pushing costs up from the initial $100.8 million estimate to the newly updated $159.5 million today. e site proved far more challenging than even expected, the design plans remained unfinalized until well aer construction began, and the ambitious 31-month planning and construction timeline le little wiggle room for changes without significant costs, City Manager Edward Augustus wrote to the City Council in a Jan. 8 memo. "Aer the design development process was completed in the fall of 2019, it was clear that the project team underestimated the costs associated with this unique site," Augustus wrote. e construction of the Polar PHOTO/GRANT WELKER BY GRANT WELKER Worcester Business Journal News Editor Polar Park, who pays what? Since it was first announced as a $101-million project in August 2018, the cost of the Polar Park baseball stadium has risen to $160 million. Here's who is responsible for paying those expenses: *Includes $1.5 million in federal CARES Act funds to cover coronavirus pandemic-costs and $9.2 million in grants from MassWorks, MassDevelopment and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Source: City of Worcester City of Worcester $64.8 million $88.2 million Worcester Red Sox $36 million $60.6 million State & federal governments $0 $10.7 million* Entity Initial responsibility in 2018 Current responsibility Why Polar Park costs so much e Worcester ballpark went 58% over its original budget as its tight timeline, challenging topography and contamination drove up expenses Stadium site complications were laid out in a May 2018 planning document, including an underground culvert (in light blue at left) and a roughly 18-foot grade change, shown at center and right. Prepping the site cost $30 million more than initially estimated. IMAGES/COURTESY OF WORCESTER RED SOX Polar Park's seats have been installed and a playing field has been created, and games could begin as early as April.

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