Portland Timbers reveal design plans for PGE Park

PGE Park’s field will slide toward home plate, snug in the crook of the stadium’s grandstand. A larger video screen will appear against the Multnomah Athletic Club, along with a standing-room/stage area. Most notably, covered seats and a club level will mushroom from the stadium’s nearly empty east side, ushering scarf-snapping fans to within a throw-in of the sideline.

Details of the stadium’s $31 million retrofit for the Portland Timbers’ move to Major League Soccer in 2011, released Monday to The Oregonian, show a higher-capacity, more upscale venue that strives to retain its
bandbox charm.

Spectators will line all four edges of the field, rather than two, and passersby still will glimpse games through the fence along Southwest 18th Avenue. The result of the renovation, scheduled to start in January and finish by spring 2011, will be “as unique as they come in the soccer world,” Timbers owner Merritt Paulson said.

— Excerpt from OregonLive.com, December 21, 2009