How big would the new Royals stadium in the Crossroads be? Here’s what we know
The Kansas City Royals are hoping to see around 35,000 of you in the Crossroads in April 2028.
The team on Tuesday announced a proposed location for a new stadium centered on the site of the former Kansas City Star Press Pavilion at 1601 McGee Street along downtown’s south loop, near the Power & Light District.
The new renderings show the site bordered by Grand Boulevard on the west, 17th Street to the south, Locust Street to the east and Truman Road to the north.
Such a stadium could be expected to hold up to 35,000 fans, Royals president Brooks Sherman said. Kauffman Stadium’s current capacity is 37,903, so the new stadium would host around 3,000 fewer people.
Team officials did not reveal the dimensions of the baseball field to be built in the stadium, but Sherman said the team likes the field at Kauffman. It is one of the largest in Major League Baseball, with center field sitting 410 feet away from home plate and both left and right fields 387 feet away.
Jackson County voters will decide in an April 2 election whether to issue a new 40-year, 3/8th-cent sales tax to help finance the new Royals ballpark and renovate Arrowhead Stadium for the Chiefs.
If the vote passes, the stadium will be built by Populous, a Kansas City-based architecture company. The firm expects the project to take up 17.3 acres of land in the Crossroads, Earl Santee, CEO and founder of Populous said.
The Royals anticipate having the stadium ready by Opening Day 2028, according to Sarah Tourville, the team’s executive vice president.
In an answer to widely held concerns about the availability of parking for a downtown ballpark, Santee said the new stadium would be within a 10-minute walk of 40,000 parking spaces, compared to the 26,000 at the Truman Sports Complex, where Kauffman Stadium is located.
