Baseball site would cost Palm Beach Gardens $5.8M: appraisers

If Palm Beach Gardens wants to build spring training baseball stadium, it will need to pay $5.8 million to buy the nearly 82-acre county-owned park site, the Palm Beach Post reported, citing two county-commissioned appraisals.

The appraisers, who respectively put the price at $6.2 million and $5.3 million, said they expect the property to receive a deed restriction that would prevent it from residential or any non-baseball stadium use. The stadium itself, which would be occupied by the Houston Astros and Toronto Blue Jays, is projected to cost $100 million.

Audrey Wolf, director of facilities development and operations for the county, said she is advising the county to use $2.6 million from the sale to fund infrastructure repairs at the stadium.

The county bought the still-undeveloped property near Central Boulevard in 2000 for $3.1 million.

Plans also call for transforming a walking path under power lines near Timber Trace Elementary and Watson B. Duncan Middle schools into a four-lane extension of Shady Lakes Drive in the single-family home community of Shady Lakes. This would connect the road with another road that not only gives access to the two schools but also the training site. [Palm Beach Post] — Mark Maurer