As football season quickly approaches, the team comes one more year closer to playing its last game on the Parkway – and its first on the banks of the Malden River.
The Everett Memorial Stadium on the Parkway has been the focal point of about every fall in Everett for the last several decades, but in time it appears more certain that the focal point will move to the new parkland at Seven Acres Park – with plans for a new Stadium there moving further into design this summer.
City Planner Tony Sousa said the City has hired Nv5 design firm as its owners project manager (OPM) to begin the scope of the project. It is the same firm that worked on the new stadium at UMass-Amhert.
“We do have them on as our OPM and we have them on a limited scope at this time that is $50,000,” he said. “The process is for them to come back with several high-level completed layouts with some designs.”
The idea is to move the Stadium to the area where Seven Acre Park is at now, bringing with it a recreation center and connecting it to the new existing amenities – such as the head-turning practice field that was built by Encore this year.
“I think the natural discussion is to have a high school/collegiate-style field with lots of public amenities and recreation that could complement all activities of the schools for football, lacrosse, soccer, field hockey and track and field. This Stadium would complement the practice field that is just being finished now by Encore. We have a shortage of playing fields and space for organized sports and activities now. We’re going to see a lot of utilization of this field. The public space there is going to be heavily utilized and it’s going to be a great place to be.”
The City already has set aside $2 million for the design of the project in the Capital Improvement Plan (CIP), but has no intention on spending that money in the early stages happening now.
The next step, he said, if for Nv5 to come back with the conceptual plans, and then shop those around to the community – including the schools, youth leagues, the DPW and others.
In the late fall, he said, they would like to put out a bid for an architect to design the new Stadium based on the conceptual plan being worked out right now.
That plan will also include a recreation building too, he said.
“The architect will be charged with relocating the Stadium to RiverGreen and designing some type of recreation building on land adjacent to the Stadium,” he said. “The footprint fits the existing footprint.”
He said there is no plan right now as to what to do with the current Stadium site on the Parkway. However, he said rumors about it being sold are not true whatsoever.
“The Stadium is public land so any attempt to dispose of the Stadium would require state, City and local approvals,” he said. “We would go through the process. We have no plan to do that yet. Right now we’re focusing on building a new Stadium and bringing over a recreation center. Once the Stadium is built in a couple of years, we can talk about that land.”
He said the Memorial to veterans on the Parkway would not be demolished.