Woodstock Gives Their Approval

You can now call it official. The Woodstock City Council, after six hours of discussion, have approved of the proposed ballpark for a Frontier League team in the city. The council approved a special use permit for the proposal, 6-1, with 50 conditions, so it was a no brainer according to them. The plan ties an unpopular gravel pit to this popular ballpark proposal. The expected grand opening of this ballpark in Woodstock, Illinois will be for the 2010 FL season.

Tom Merryman and Aggregate Inc. are just part of the collective effort into building up this new ballpark. Merryman hopes to begin work on the ballpark sometime in March of 2009. Stadium construction would ideally begin in June, and the first game for the FL team would start sometime in May 2010, said Tom Zanck, Merryman's attorney. Also, I have noticed that there are alot of acres involved in these negotiations. It's amazing what people will debate about when you talk about 100 acres of land and over.

Here's an interesting tidbit; according to Tom Zanck, if the vote on this new ballpark proposal had been delayed until January of 2009, it would be too late for the new team to begin play in Woodstock for the 2010 season. Plus, if the stadium has not been constructed by May 1, 2014, Merryman would deed the 38-acre parcel for the stadium to the city of Woodstock, according to one of the proposal's 50 conditions. I guess another issue that rises up here is what are the 50 conditions?, and what are they about?

From a competitive standpoint now in the Frontier League, I do wonder alittle. I'm not upset by any means, but I wonder why you would load up on Chicago when there is help needed around Florence and Washington. Of course, Avon, Ohio will help out the Wild Things alittle bit, but that's just replacing the Paints as the lone Ohio team that connects to Washington. There was alot of talk in the past of getting Washington a nearby rival, such as what the FL attempted to do for Butler, Pennsylvania way back when, but that bottom fell out. And for Florence...I don't know what you can say about their traveling situation. The Freedom seem to be on an island all by themselves now, and the closest they could possibly be would be to Evansville and Avon. I see a big gap there.

http://www.nwherald.com/articles/2008/12/17/56249429/index.xml