would it be weird to pitch a tent down there NOW just to be sure I'm first in line on opening day? i'm so frickin excited about this...

11th photo from top. I like the woman on the balcony who looks suicidal. "Don't jump, If it's worth dying for it's worth living for."

Man, I gotta hand it to these work crews out there. We live next to the site and I see them out there every morning. Because of the location, the wind can gust pretty strongly down where they are working on the Plaza. Kudos to these tough dudes.

Instead of statues of Paul and Babe, I'd rather see a statue/memorial for Kirby Puckett.

Yes, a big thanks to all the construction workers. I hope the team hooks them up with some free tickets.

And thank you Rick for posting these detailed pictures. You are making this process a lot of fun for us Twins fans, especially those of us who don't live in Minnesota.

I second Lafferty, Thank you for a fantastic site. I check in every day. It's great for us living in the out-state areas. The Twins should be paying you. They have some x-tra cash now, don't they?

I walk by the site every morning, and those construction guys/gals are constantly working. I never see them standing around. Which is very refreshing for us office drones who have to watch people sit and play solitare and minesweeper for 8 straight hours.

Awesome job Rick, you are a great writer and have an obvious passion not just for baseball, but for the history of this area. Would you mind starting another site for the Gopher stadium as well! J/K!! sort of...

The Twin just signed a veteran pitcher.
Livan Hernandez.

Rick, Thanks for all your hard work, Seriously, the Twins should be paying you. But, man, you posted that at 2:40 in the morning...Don't lose sleep over this man!

Everyone, I present to you First Avenue.

Ladies and gentleman, I give you First Avenue. (click name)

As usual Rick, kudos on the great work and great site. You make the whole ballpark experience so much more enjoyable than just being patient and waiting until April 2010.

Now onto the comments:

1.) I am neither Norwegian nor Scandinavian thank you very much! But, I am proud of my German, Irish & French ancestry. That being said you grandmother sounds like a fine, upstanding woman.

2.) I give credit where credit is due to the Twins for putting up incremental money towards stadium costs, but I really, really don't like how in the Strib article (click John Kasper's name) it says the planned surrounding neighborhood infrastructure improvements are beginning to take a back seat when it comes to “staying within the asinine $90 million surrounding infrastructure cap”. I hate that the legislature had to throw that into the bill to appease SOME of the outstate MN & suburban folks who hate all things Minneapolis and wanted to make sure the city would get as little incremental infrastructure improvement as possible. The new ballpark is awesome and the crown jewel obviously, but I honestly believe the ballpark AND the neighborhood are both key parts of the puzzle here and must work together for this to truly be what we all want it to be in the end.

3.) I will be very disappointed if (this is coming from a Hennepin County resident footing part of the bill with no reservations what so ever) Hennepin County, the City of Minneapolis, the state (you outstate MN folks want to pay for some of this – here is your chance) or a combination of them doesn’t find additional money to make sure the surrounding neighborhood infrastructure (updated streets, sidewalks, greenery, etc.) is up to form on Day 1 when the ballpark opens. I have been down there numerous times over the last several months and there are several streets, sidewalks, etc. right around the ballpark site that need A LOT of work.

Just my two cents, but I think most of you who have actually been following this closely and are genuinely excited about the new ballpark’s future would agree.

Betaband,

The a-hole you can thank for that $90 million cap is Phil Krinkie of Shoreview. While the bill was in his Tax Committee that was his poison pill.

Thankfull the prick lost in the following election. If life were left up to Mr. Krinkie, we would be driving horse drawn carriages on unpaved roads.

kevin in az - thanks for the info about dr. no. i am familiar with the giant tool bag that is phil krinkie. i was also very pleased to see him lose his re-election bid.

he was one of those types similar to current minnesota republican house minority leader marty seifert who are just miserable little smart-ass punks who would like to, as you said: "see us all driving around in horse carriages on unpaved roads" as long as it meant our collective taxes don’t go up a penny.

You know what would be a great asset to this stadium? Valet bike parking. Click my name for a nice link with a video of how they do it at San Francisco's ballpark.

Here is a pic of the green seats for Citi Field. It looks like our seats will be the same color.

Nice to see they've decided to extend the plaza entrance all the way First. That is the most key element to connect the park to downtown. Trees and streetscape improvements for the surrounding neighborhood would be nice but from day one the park has to have a seamless connection to downtown at its main entrance. Streetscape improvements can be added at a later date.

tim said: "streetscape improvements can be added at a later date".

i respectfully disagree, tim. when things are approached by decision makers with an attitude of "we will get to it after the fact", more often than not we never do. and that would be a big mistake in regards to this project.

i agree that the full plaza connection to downtown is very important, but so is the neighborhood redevelopment piece. wrigley field in chicago is successful because it works in concert with the neighborhood it resides in. in my opinion the twins ballpark has two neighbors to work in concert with: 1.) downtown minneapolis 2.) the north loop

case in point. the promise of redevelopment in the neighborhood around the metrodome when it was being built. it never happened after the fact and we see where that got us in the long run.

tim said: "streetscape improvements can be added at a later date".

i respectfully disagree, tim. when things are approached by decision makers with an attitude of "we will get to it after the fact", more often than not we never do. and that would be a big mistake in regards to this project.

i agree that the full plaza connection to downtown is very important, but so is the neighborhood redevelopment piece. wrigley field in chicago is successful because it works in concert with the neighborhood it resides in. in my opinion the twins ballpark has two neighbors to work in concert with: 1.) downtown minneapolis 2.) the north loop

case in point. the promise of redevelopment in the neighborhood around the metrodome when it was being built. it never happened after the fact and we see where that got us in the long run.

Are they still planning on changing the canopy from gray to the champagne/brown color?

beware of any comments that invoke wrigley field.

Let's be careful with the Wrigley Field comparisons. I have lived in Chicago for 3 years now and I have come to realize that, on the outside, Wrigley is a dump, and the neighborhood around it is a dump. On game day the neighborhood changes because there are 36,000 people flooding in and yes, it's quite a thing to be a part of, but any other day, it's quite like any other neighborhood. There are no pretty trees, no flower gardens. The new ballpark and Wrigley are just too different, (except in size) to be compared. The new Ballpark is going to be much better!

St Peter updated his blog....some good stuff in there. Click my name to view.

Let's just hope that concessionaire they hire isn't like the one at the Dome. It would be nice to have popcorn which was popped somtime during the same month which it's being served. Oh and old hot dogs from the game before, sitting in water??? Yeah, we can upgrade dollar dog night to FRESH dogs please!!

I'm pretty sure dollar dogs will be replaced by six dollar sushi

Holy plaza! Check out the webcam. This is going quickly.

I'd rather pay $6 for sushi that those crap dollar dogs. It will be nice to get an actual "meal" at the game for those of us that go straight from work. Right now the options are very limited and usually to get something you want, you have to walk all around the dome and miss an entire inning.

I also hope there are radio/tv broadcasts in the bathroom. right now you only hear cheers or silence and then have to guess as to what happened.

wtf?