Does the city need a new baseball stadium?

I don’t follow professional baseball enough to know whether the recent proposal to eliminate 40 minor league teams, including our own Chattanooga Lookouts, is a good idea or not.

What I do know is that the proposal either speeds up the moving of the team from the 20-year-old AT&T Field up on Hawk Hill (for you old-timers) to a shiny new one with all the bells and whistles, or it means we eventually lose the team.

To make the stadium work on the site years ago, it had to be built with the stands facing the setting sun, which sounds kind of quaint and scenic, but in effect makes it the hottest place in the whole city during the summer months.

It is also 20 years old and therefore it doesn’t meet MLB standards as far as amenities go. Despite that, attendance this past summer was among the best in the league, and that is because people here like baseball and the staff there does a great job of making people feel comfortable and welcome.

But, should a new park be built in part with taxpayer dollars? It has been proposed that it be built as part of a multi-use facility at the old Wheland Foundry site on Broad Street.

Personally, I think I’d like to see it happen, but I won’t even begin to say whether it should or if it will be successful.

I would point out that such a move would theoretically shift some focus, and therefore dollars, to that part of town. As I’ve pointed out before, the growth of business on the Southside has been to the detriment of businesses in the Central City part of town.

And I predict East Ridge near Exit 1 will continue to draw people in the future as well.

› If you’ve been looking for a locally produced radio talk show about home repair and home improvement, WFLI has what you want.

“The Home Talk Guys Radio Show” recently moved its operations from Manchester, Tennessee, to Chattanooga. It airs on both WFLI-FM 97.7 and WFLI-AM 1070 Saturdays from 8 to 9 a.m.

“The show is a cross between home repair/home improvement call in, humorous radio skits and silly commercials for make-believe items and services we wish existed (e.g., back-up buddies, a service that backs up your design position with an ‘expert’ should you and a partner/loved one disagree on a home improvement),” writes Ken Palombo with the show.

He adds that it is a bit like “A Prairie Home Companion.”

Barry Courter