2011-05-21

Jeld Wen Field

Jeld-Wen Field

Jeld-Wen Field
JeldWenField.png
Former names PGE Park
Multnomah Stadium
Civic Stadium
Location 1844 SW Morrison,
Portland, Oregon 97205
Coordinates 45°31′17″N 122°41′30″W / 45.52139°N 122.69167°WCoordinates: 45°31′17″N 122°41′30″W / 45.52139°N 122.69167°W
Broke ground 1925
Opened 1926
Renovated 1956, 1982
2001, 2011
Owner City of Portland
Operator Peregrine Sports, LLC
Surface Field Turf
Construction cost USD $31 million
(2010 Renovation)
Architect Morris H. Whitehouse
Capacity 20,000
Tenants
Portland Timbers
Portland State University Vikings

Jeld-Wen Field (formerly PGE Park; Civic Stadium; originally Multnomah Stadium) is a multi-purpose stadium located in Portland, Oregon, United States. It opened in 1926 and underwent major renovations in 2001, with naming rights being bought by Portland General Electric (PGE), and again in 2011 when the naming rights were sold to Jeld-Wen in preparation for the 2011 Major League Soccer season. The stadium sits on a rectangular block bounded by Southwest Morrison Street, Southwest 18th Avenue, the Athletic Club building and Southwest Salmon Street, and Southwest 20th Avenue.

Description

Jeld-Wen Field is an outdoor stadium which will be home for MLS Portland Timbers and Portland State University Vikings football. The stadium underwent a $31 million renovation in late 2010 and early 2011. The stadium is owned by the City of Portland, and is managed by Peregrine Sports, LLC, the entity that owns Portland Timbers. Prior to the 2011 MLS season, the stadium was re-named Jeld-Wen Field from PGE Park, in a partnership with Klamath Falls, Oregon based company Jeld-Wen.

The Multnomah Athletic Club, an exclusive athletic club in downtown Portland, stands next door; the windows of the north side of the club's building overlook the field.

The Interstate 405 freeway in Portland is also known locally as the Stadium Freeway and travels near the stadium. In addition, the Jeld-Wen Field MAX Light Rail station is across the street. The property slopes significantly downhill from the north end to the south end, with the result that the playing surface sits well below street level.

Tenants and major events

Principal tenants include the Portland Timbers and the Portland State University Vikings football team.

On March 18, 2009, The Oregonian reported that a renovated stadium would be home to the 18th Major League Soccer team, which would replace the USL-1 Timbers and begin play for the 2011 season. An official news conference confirmed all of this on March 20. Due to MLS's concerns about the playing surface, seating configuration, and scheduling, the renovations forced the Beavers to move starting in 2011. After plans for a new stadium for the Beavers fell through in 2010, team owner Merritt Paulson put the Beavers up for sale. The club's major-league parent, the San Diego Padres, purchased the team, which will play in Tucson, Arizona as the Tucson Padres until a new stadium in the San Diego suburb of Escondido is completed in 2013.

History

The stadium was originally built by the Multnomah Athletic Club in 1926 though playing fields and earlier stadiums had stood on the site since 1893. The stadium was a popular site for greyhound racing during the Great Depression. In the 1950s, the Portland Beavers moved to the stadium after their original field, Vaughn Street Park, was condemned.

The Portland Beavers minor-league baseball team of the Pacific Coast League played their final game at the stadium on September 6, 2010. The Beavers will be moving to Tucson, Arizona for the 2011 and 2012 seasons before occupying their permanent home in suburban San Diego in 2013.

In addition to its current and prior tenants, the stadium has hosted several other noteworthy events. On August 28, 1977, it was site of the North American Soccer League Soccer Bowl '77 between the New York Cosmos and the Seattle Sounders, which was to be the last official game of the legendary Pele. It was the site of four group matches in the 1999 Women's World Cup and hosted two group matches, two quarterfinals, and both semifinals in the 2003 Women's World Cup. The stadium also hosted an exhibition match of Australian rules football in 1990.

On September 2, 1957 Elvis Presley performed one of the first outdoor stadium rock concerts in music history (Elvis held the first ever in Vancouver, BC, Canada just a few days earlier at Empire Stadium) here on his four day tour of the Pacific Northwest. The concert created mass hysteria and an estimated 14,000 people attended the concert.

The stadium hosted single-A baseball during two periods when AAA baseball left the city; from 1973 to 1977 it hosted the Portland Mavericks, and 1995 to 2000, the Portland Rockies. The stadium hosted the old Portland Timbers of the North American Soccer League from 1975 through 1982, and the USFL's Portland Breakers, as well as the Portland Storm and Portland Thunder of the WFL. In 1977, the North American Soccer League held its championship game at the stadium between the New York Cosmos and the Seattle Sounders. It was during this championship game that Pelé played his last professional game as the Cosmos defeated the Sounders.

Also during the 1970s, the Jantzen swim wear company had a 3D model of the Jantzen girl attached by cable to the left field wall, hovering. The Jantzen girl was in play because it was below the top of the wall and it was hit a couple of times over the years. If you look upward behind the home plate area of the main concourse, you can see it hanging in the air from cables. On May 27, 1991, the stadium got some national attention when Vancouver Canadians outfielder Rodney McCray, while attempting to catch a fly ball, literally crashed through a wooden advertising behind the warning track in right-center field, just to the right of the 369-foot sign; a real-life version of an incident in the fictional book and film, The Natural. While McCray failed to make the out, he only suffered scrapes and bruises in the incident (unlike the fictional "Bump Bailey", whose injuries were fatal), and remained in the game. Highlight reels of that play ran for weeks on cable channels such as CNN and ESPN. On August 12, 2006, the Beavers commemorated the event with a Rodney McCray Bobblehead Night, passing out bobbleheads of McCray to fans and renaming right-center field "McCray Alley".

A $38.5 million renovation took place in 2001, adding new luxury suites and club seats that replaced the seats behind home plate and upgrading the seating and concourse area. The renovation also improved the structural soundness of the facility, and included a state-of-the-art sound system. The renovation also includes some retro-features, such as a manually-operated baseball scoreboard. At that point, the stadium was renamed, with PGE buying naming rights.

On October 27, 2007, the stadium hosted what was at the time the highest scoring game in NCAA football history, when the Weber State University Wildcats defeated the PSU Vikings 73-68, a combined point total of 141 points. This point total eclipsed the previous NCAA record of 136 points, set in a 1968 Division III game, and the previous Division I record of 133 points, set in 2004. While this record lasted only two weeks, and has been surpassed three times in all, it remains the highest-scoring game involving NCAA Division I teams.

On July 1, 2009, the venue hosted the third-round match of the Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup between the Portland Timbers and their rivals the Seattle Sounders FC. On July 15, 2009, it hosted the Triple-A All-Star Game, with the International League stars defeating the Pacific Coast league 6–5. 16,657 fans attended the game, the largest crowd for a Triple-A All-Star game since 1991, and the third largest ever. Later that month, the Portland city council approved a $31 million renovation to make it ready for the 2011 Major League Soccer season. The stadium will be used for soccer and football activities primarily. This renovation also means that the Portland Beavers will vacate the stadium for a different location. The exact capacity after renovation is unknown as of this writing, with an early report that about 6,500 seats would be added. However a later presentation to the Portland Design Commission indicated that only 5,000 seats would be added bringing top capacity to about 22,000, but with only 17,000 available for use on a regular basis. The renovation meets Major League Soccer standards and introducing new amenities.The playing surface will shift west and north. There is more space on the east and south sides, with new seating areas. New Field Turf will be installed as part of the renovation in advance of the 2011 MLS season.

The newly renovated stadium will make its debut on April 14, 2011 when Major League Soccer's Portland Timbers play host to the Chicago Fire.

Feral cat colony

The field has been home to a feral cat colony since approximately 1985, and may have been at the park before the current stadium opened in 1926. There are an estimated 12-19 cats in the colony, referred to as "living rat traps". After a construction worker killed a feral cat in 2000, the park enlisted the Feral Cat Coalition of Oregon to assist the animals during construction efforts and to run a Trap-Neuter-Return program. The cats are discussed in Chuck Palahniuk's travelogue of Portland, Fugitives and Refugees.

References

External links






Retrieved from : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeld-Wen_Field
Posted by at