Design and construction of Minneapolis’s Target Field, a $545-million ballpark for baseball’s Minnesota Twins, was like stuffing 12 lb of potatoes into an 8-lb bag. The eight-acre site not only was hemmed in on all sides by roads and rails, it really needed 12 acres to comfortably accommodate the program for a 40,000-seat ballpark. Because the neighbors were so close, there was no lay-down area or viable crane path outside the bowl’s footprint. Thus, the ballpark had to be constructed from the inside out, which builders consider far from ideal.
The many restrictions, including up to 14 partial time-outs per day while freight trains rolled by, didn’t keep Mortenson Construction, the local construction manager-at-risk, from finishing the job on budget and so early that, beginning in late December, there was little more to do than sit back and “watch the grass grow.” Mortenson received a temporary certificate of occupancy on Dec. 22, an unheard-of, three-plus months before the April 12 home opener. Substantial completion was achieved more than two months before the March 3 date set in Mortenson’s original $392-million, guaranteed-maximum-price contract, despite $65 million in enhancements. “It’s the first time we finished [a ballpark] so early,” says John Wood, a Mortenson senior vice president.