New Deal for Fans

The baseball fan is probably the most set-upon spectator in sport. Insulted by ushers, gouged by concessionaires, he fights his way into a dirty, crowded ballpark, squeezes happily into a viselike seat --and often finds himself neatly positioned behind a post. Last week it seemed at last that the long-suffering spectator might be getting a break: around the major leagues were sprouting new stadiums designed to make watching more of a pleasure, less of a chore.

In suburban Flushing Meadows, N.Y., bulldozers were clearing the ground for a plush, $23 million ballpark that will house the National League's fledgling New York Mets. In Houston, construction gangs worked on the world's first domed, air-conditioned sports stadium--home next year of the National League's Houston Colt .453.

In Washington, D.C., and Los Angeles, fans are even more fortunate: next month, when the 1962 season opens, they will watch their baseball in boldly designed new stadiums whose architecture alone is worth the price of admission.

Perched on the bank of the Anacostia River, two miles from downtown Washington, the $23 million District of Columbia Stadium looks like a concrete rollercoaster. Home of the American League's last-place Senators and the National Football League's lowly (one win, twelve losses, one tie) Redskins, D.C. Stadium seats 50,000 for football, 43,500 for baseball. It is as comfortable as it is big. A cantilevered upper deck eliminates the need for view-obstructing posts, and a roof shields 60% of the seats from sun and rain. Each seat is a minimum of 20 in. wide (v. the standard 17 in.), and many are thoughtfully equipped with outlets for electric blankets. Scattered strategically about the stadium are 45 rest rooms and 27 concession stands. There is a 12,500-car parking lot, a heliport and a boat landing. Players get into uniform in one of eight dressing rooms, wait their turn at bat in an air-conditioned dugout.

The stadium even has its own jail for disorderly fans.

Peach for Status. If oversized B.C.

Stadium is a monument to optimism (its seating capacity is unlikely to be taxed), Los Angeles' $18 million Dodger Stadium is a shrine of success: since they moved to Los Angeles and its 95,000-seat Coliseum in 1958, the onetime Brooklyn Bums have smashed every attendance record in the National League. A seven-level pleasure dome of concrete, steel, aluminum, glass, plastic and brick, their new stadium is situated in Chavez Ravine, just five minutes from downtown Los Angeles, holds only 56,000 fans. But canny Dodger President Walter O'Malley expects no decline in revenues. Ticket prices range from $1.50 for a one-day unreserved ticket to $400 for a season pass to the "dugout boxes, and membership in the Stadium Club costs $300.

No sports stadium in history has been so self-conscious about status. Each ticket is "color coded" (ocher, peach, coral, sea-mist green, sky blue) to match the decor of a specific seating area, and coral-ticketed fans are not even permitted to visit their peachy friends. They even can park in separate lots assigned to ticket holders by color. But whatever his hue, no fan is mistreated. An "elephant train" ferries him from his car to the stadium; elevators whisk him to his seating area at 200 ft. per second. As at D.C. Stadium, he sits in an extra-wide seat, and there are no posts, pillars or columns to block his view. Four scoreboards keep him abreast of every pitch and play. The stadium's glareproof lighting system is the best in the major leagues, and its clubhouse and press sections are comfortable and well planned.

Never Faultless. Despite such vast improvements, nobody has yet managed to build a faultless ballpark. Washington boasts that there are no bad seats in its new stadium, but the claim is not quite true: fans sitting behind home plate cannot follow the flight of a fly ball, because a jutting mezzanine lip blocks the view.

Its massive $250,000 Scoreboard is one of the most modern in the U.S.--but tucked away behind a 7-ft.-high outfield fence, it is also one of the hardest to see.

In car-choked Los Angeles, the problems are more serious. Construction of a bridge that was supposed to connect Dodger Stadium to the Pasadena Freeway has been delayed, and existing "escape routes" are steep, twisting and narrow.

One rear-end collision or a single stalled car, say traffic experts, and the ball game would be played to an audience of hikers and gophers.

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