The White Sox are negotiating with developer Related Midwest about the possibility of building a new ballpark on the South Loop parcel known as “The 78.”
Sources familiar with the talks, all of whom asked to remain anonymous, described the negotiations for a baseball-only stadium as “serious.”
The Illinois Sports Facilities Authority, which owns and financed Guaranteed Rate Field, has not yet been involved in the discussions, according to the authority’s CEO Frank Bilecki. At some point, the stadium authority would need to get involved in determining the future of Guaranteed Rate Field and possibly in building a new ballpark, if it is publicly funded.
The potential site at Roosevelt Road and Clark Street is owned by Related Midwest. Company president Curt Bailey refused to comment on the talks. So did Sox spokesperson Scott Reifert and Jason Lee, a senior adviser to Mayor Brandon Johnson.
Johnson and Sox Chairman Jerry Reinsdorf issued a joint statement in response to questions from the Sun-Times. It made no mention of the possibility of moving the Sox from their current home at Guaranteed Rate Field to the South Loop tract, which acquired its nickname for its potential to become Chicago’s 78th neighborhood,
“We met to discuss the historic partnership between the team and Chicago and the team’s ideas for remaining competitive in Chicago in perpetuity,” the joint statement said.
Reinsdorf, 87, acknowledged last summer he was exploring the possibility of leaving Guaranteed Rate Field when the team’s lease expires after the 2029 season.
Guaranteed Rate Field sits in the middle of 70-acres of stadium parking.
One-of-a-kind site in prime location
At 62 acres stretching south to 16th Street, “The 78” is one of Chicago’s largest undeveloped parcels — and certainly the most strategically located. But it has somehow eluded development for decades.
Once owned by convicted political power player Tony Rezko, it was one of several sites in the running for a Chicago casino now planned for River West.
Rezko’s partner in the the South Loop land deal was Nadhmi Auchi, an Iraqi billionaire living in London who was convicted of accepting illegal commissions in an oil deal in France. Auchi was fined and sentenced to probation.
As of 2019, Auchi still owned the site after taking on Related Midwest as a new partner. It’s unclear if Auchi still owns a piece of the site.
Gov. J.B. Pritzker now has a plan to use at least part of the property for a University of Illinois tech research center known as “Discovery Partners Institute.” That’s the only concrete project on the drawing board for The 78.
Discovery Partners has been expected to use about 4 acres on the southern part of the site. Bill Jackson, executive director, said he has heard the White Sox may be interested and thinks the team would make a great neighbor.
A rendering shows the view from the Chicago River of the new Discovery Partners Institute building planned at The 78. It is unclear how the possibility of a new ballpark being built on the same site would affect the Institute.
“A new Sox Park could bring the infrastructure we need” for the institute, Jackson said. “I think it would be great.”
Jackson added that DPI has a firm commitment to staying at The 78. “Our game plan doesn’t work without being there,” he said.
A spokesperson for DPI said it expects to break ground on its project later this year. She said bids for the construction are expected to go before the state’s capital development board in a few weeks.
Can White Sox share new site?
But a Chicago developer familiar with the property, who requested anonymity, said the institute has been “trying to get out of that deal for a couple of years.”
The site isn’t big enough to accommodate both Discovery Partners and a baseball stadium with its parking lots anyway, the developer said, adding: “They’ll have to move elsewhere.”
But Marc Ganis, a veteran Chicago-based stadium consultant, disagreed.
Roughly 12 to 14 acres would be needed for a baseball-only stadium seating 35,000 to 38,000, Ganis said. A parking structure holding 7,000 cars could fit on another 3 acres, he said, allowing both projects to fit.
An aerial shot looking north at the Loop, showing the undeveloped 62-acre site at Roosevelt Road and Clark Street that has become known as The 78.
Sources said mass transit access — the nearby Roosevelt station serves the CTA’s Red, Green and Orange lines — could reduce the need for stadium parking. With the Chicago River just west of the site, sources also noted the possibility of water taxi service for game-day crowds.
Ganis called The 78 the “best undeveloped site” in Chicago and is not surprised the Sox are considering it.
“If the White Sox are to stay in the city proper, that is an excellent location. … It’s a clear site that has mass transit and highway access around it. It is one of the very few locations in the urban core of Chicago that could have a well-situated stadium on it,” Ganis said.
Railroad tracks bisecting the land only make it “even more” attractive as a stadium site, Ganis said.
“When you have an active railroad line or railroad stations going through a location, there are only so many things you can do with that property. Housing is challenging. Commercial development is challenging. A sports facility that is operated only at certain times and when it’s operating, noise is expected anyway, is well-located there,” Ganis said.
“Look at the two stadiums in Baltimore. They were built on old railroad land with an active rail line right alongside of them.”
Railroad tracks run through The 78, a large undeveloped parcel just south of downtown Chicago, but the tracks shouldn’t be a deterrent to a new White Sox stadium, should the team choose to move there, one local consultant said.
Tyler Pasciak LaRiviere/Sun-Times
Ganis likened the Sox quest for a new home to the stadium development in suburban Atlanta known as “The Battery.”
Truist Park, home of the Atlanta Braves, is a stadium-anchored mixed-used development that includes hotels, restaurants, shopping and other entertainment and business uses within walking distance of the stadium.
“It’s been very successful. There are lots of teams in baseball that are looking at emulating what the Atlanta Braves have done,” Ganis said.
1988 stadium deal stopped Sox move to Florida
Guaranteed Rate Field opened in 1991 across the street from the team’s old home, the now-demolished Comiskey Park. Financing for the new stadium came together in an eleventh-hour deal that prevented the Sox from moving to St. Petersburg, Fla.
Then-Gov. Jim Thompson stopped the clock to personally lobby lawmakers, who approved the deal after the session’s midnight deadline in 1988.
The initial lease was highly favorable to the Sox. For the first decade, the team paid no rent if annual attendance fell below 1.2 million. Under its current lease, the team pays $1.5 million in annual rent. The Sox control revenue from ticket sales, concessions, parking and merchandise operations.
The lease has been amended in recent years to allow the Sox to open a team store and a restaurant on state-owned land across the street from the ballpark.
Guaranteed Rate Field was financed with revenue generated by an increase in the tax on Chicago hotel rooms. The city and state each contribute $5 million annually. It has been renovated over the years, but without the development around the ballpark the Sox apparently covet. Instead, the ballpark is surrounded by about 70 acres of surface parking.
The White Sox have a fan store and bar built into one of the ballpark’s access ramps on the other side of 35th Street, but there is little other development in the immediate vicinity.
At the same time the Sox are pondering a move, the Bears are continuing their search for a new Chicago home after spending $197.2 million to purchase the site of the Arlington International Racecourse, then running into a property tax roadblock from suburban school districts.
The 78 could be a possible site for a Bears stadium, but sources said the team isn’t interested. And if the team were to build in Chicago, sources said Bears President Kevin Warren is focused on a site such as Soldier Field’s south parking lot.
A White Sox move to the South Loop also could affect the Chicago Fire soccer team. Sources said the Fire, which now plays at Soldier Field, could move to Guaranteed Rate Field if the baseball team moves out.
“We have not engaged with the Illinois Sports Facilities Authority about playing at Guaranteed Rate Field,” said Fire spokesman Jhamie Chin, adding that the team has been focused on starting construction on its Performance Center for training and team offices on the Near West Side.
The soccer team’s lease at Soldier Field has two more years to run, but the club has extensions that could cover another five years.
Reinsdorf has called the 2023 White Sox season, his 43rd in baseball, “absolutely the worst season I’ve ever been through.”
At the time, Reinsdorf was asked if the experience was so bad, he considered unloading the team.
“I’m going to couch this so nobody writes that I thought of selling,” he said with a chuckle.
“Friends of mine have said why don’t you sell, why don’t you get out? And my answer always has been, ‘I like what I’m doing, as bad as it is, and what else would I do?’ I’m a boring guy. I don’t play golf. I don’t play bridge. What else would I do? And I want to make it better, I want to make it better before I go.”
The view south from Roosevelt Road at The 78, a parcel of undeveloped land stretching from Roosevelt south to 16th Street, between Clark Street and the Chicago River. It is being viewed as a potential site for a new White Sox stadium.
Tyler Pasciak LaRiviere/Sun-Times