Media Tour New Orlando Citrus Bowl As First Seats Installed
Mayor Buddy Dyer welcomed local media on Friday, July 25, for their first tour of the new Orlando Citrus Bowl as reconstruction continues on pace for substantial completion by November.
Following last month’s “Forward Progress To The 50” celebration, installation of the precast concrete for the new stadium lower bowl is nearly complete, finishing with the new 20,000-square-foot plaza deck in the north end zone.
Friday’s tour did not extend to the deck as work continues in that area, but Mayor Dyer was able to show off many of the building’s new amenities. Those included:
— The new locker rooms, approximately 3,500 square feet each with brand-new lockers and adjacent support facilities that far exceed the previous stadium’s capabilities. Those locker rooms are symmetrical and separated by a new dedicated media interview room that did not previously exist.
— The steel towers on the exterior of the bowl, which will support the new elevators, escalators and stairwells to get fans to their seats at every level. Over 7,000,000 pounds of steel went into the structure of the new towers.
— The wider sideline concourses, which will house added concession and restroom facilities. The new concourses are approximately 40 feet wide, almost double the width of the old stadium, and will also be multi-level for the first time. Both the field and plaza level concourses wrapping around the entire stadium.
— The plaza level that will eventually house approximately 60,000 square feet of club space (half enclosed, half open-air) as well as plenty of open gathering spaces along the concourse for fans outside of the club seating areas.
From the plaza level, Mayor Dyer also pointed out the locations for the new video board that will be positioned throughout the stadium. The new facility will feature five main displays — a primary board in the south end zone, two secondary boards in the corners adjacent to the north end zone and two ribbon boards stretching along the fascia of the terrace level on the sidelines. In total, the new high-definition boards will use up over 2.8 million LED lights and offer nearly 360 degrees of display coverage.
At the end of the tour, Mayor Dyer teamed up with Parramore neighborhood and Orlando resident Ernest Jones, Jr., a contractor with L&J Installations, to affix the first two seats in the stadium’s lower bowl. With the precast concrete in place, seating installation is one of the next major milestones as construction continues.
Fans can keep up with the progress of Citrus Bowl reconstruction at our Citrus Bowl page (including a link to the Turner Construction Workzone live camera).
Tickets to the first bowl games in the new Orlando Citrus Bowl are now on sale as part of Florida Citrus Sports membership packages. For more information on membership, visit FloridaCitrusSports.com/join.