The expansion of Portage Park, home of the Kalamazoo Badgers professional baseball club and PEBA Great Lakes cellar dweller, has hit delays which will keep S Park St W closed to through traffic longer than anticipated.  Originally scheduled to be completed by the end of January, team officials have said they don’t expect the expansion to be completed until the middle of March.

The Badgers are adding 10,000 seats to their stadium in the hopes of attracting additional fans.  Despite a capacity of over 52,000 seats, the team averaged under 18,000 in attendance at home games in 2029, and anyone who attended games or watched on TV will attest that it certainly didn’t look like they had nearly that many.  Given that the team claims to have sold 13,300 season tickets for 2029, that relates to about 4,500 fans per game that purchased tickets for specific games.

Expanding the stadium to over 62,000 seats seems like a fools errand given the team’s current struggles to attract fans.  The Badgers finished last in the Great Lakes division for a third straight season, losing over 100 games each year, and don’t figure to be much better this year.

The Badgers front office contends that the team’s strong farm system, currently ranked 1st in the PEBA, means that they’re on the cusp of a sustained cycle of success.  In order to maximize the team’s revenues, they need to create a park that will be able to generate the revenue required to sustain that cycle.  So what does the park expansion entail?

The majority of the additional 10,000 seats are an expansion of the 2nd and 3rd decks over the left field bleachers, although there is a fair amount of work being done on the right field side that the team has refused to share details about.  The team has indicated that additional work will be done there in a future year, but they won’t say when or share information about exactly what that will entail.  Contractors working on that side of the stadium have signed non-disclosure agreements and aren’t sharing either.  Based on the types of building materials that can be seen getting carried into the the construction zone, large steel beams and other supporting structure, it appears to be a reinforcement project.  If there are structural integrity issues behind the 25 foot high right field fence, then that’s something fans who may be sitting there need to know about before purchasing tickets.

“There’s nothing to be concerned about,” said one insider who preferred not to have their name reported.  “Fans can purchase tickets anywhere in the stadium and be confident that they’ll have a safe, fun time at the park.  That work is related to future projects that I think everyone will enjoy.”

Those comments suggest additional construction around Portage Park, but hopefully they won’t continue to impact traffic around the stadium district downtown.  In the meantime, the team expects the street closures to last two more weeks before the rest of the construction can continue with no impact to traffic.  Northbound traffic can use Church St or Rose St, but the best bet is to avoid the area unless you really need to be nearby.