KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Kansas City Royals owner John Sherman spoke to local media Wednesday and discussed the ongoing process of looking for a potential site for a new Royals stadium.
During the conference, Sherman confirmed that the new stadium could potentially be in East Village and the organization has done a lot of research on that area.
“We talked about the East Village,” Sherman said. “We probably have done the most work on that site.”
Sherman said the process for the new stadium is still complicated, and eventually, the Kansas City Chiefs will be involved in the process, with the hope for a plan by the August ballot at the earliest.
The East Village is one of five potential sites the Royals have looked at. The Royals have also considered the old Kansas City Star building and North Kansas City as possible sites.
However, Sherman did not seem optimistic about the new stadium at the old Star building, highlighting land acquisition being a major problem.
“The owners of that property definitely had some creative ideas,” Sherman said. “I wouldn’t say it’s been eliminated, but it’s a site that has some challenges.”
Sherman seemed less concerned with that problem regarding the East Village site, but stated that significant infrastructure investment was needed there. However, he mentioned that the site would be able to handle game traffic.
“Egress and ingress (traffic) will be an important issue,” Sherman said. “I think people in Kansas City talk about parking, but there’s plenty of parking down there, but there would be some infrastructure investment to make sure that can be a good experience for the fans.”
Sherman refused to commit to a timeline for the new stadium but hoped that there was a chance the Royals could have an Opening Day in their new home between 2027 and 2028 if they could hit their targets.
Sherman also stated that his main priority currently is the on-field product more than the Royals' new stadium location.
“When I get up in the morning, I’m thinking a lot more about how we play than where we’re going to play in four or five years from now,” Sherman said. “(The stadium search) is a process and we have some really good people working on it, but I’m a lot more excited about us showing up to play the Minnesota Twins Thursday.”
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