Westfield mayor speaks on Grand Park Sports Campus expansion plans

By COLIN BAILLIE
WISH-TV | wishtv.com

Construction of a new stadium, ice rinks, and an expansion of Grand Park Sports Campus – which gets an estimated 5.5 million visitors annually – is set to begin this year in Westfield.

The new additions will include a new outdoor 10,000-seat stadium, four ice rinks, a hotel, and a convention center.

Willis

“We want to see Grand Park be a full day opportunity for our tourists,” Westfield Mayor Scott Willis said. “If they can come here and park and experience Grand Park all day long, from the games, to the entertainment, to the food, that’s a win for our residents.”

Phase 1 is set to begin this year and will include a parking garage, hotel and completion of the Indy 11 headquarters, Willis said.

“The plan with the new vision for Grand Park is to expand that operation,” Willis said. “Their women’s team has upgraded to a Super League that is kind of the top tier for women’s professional soccer. They have an agreement if you have this franchise within so many years, you have to have at least a 5,000-seat stadium. We’re going to build that and host them at Grand Park.”

Willis did not say whether the men’s Indy Eleven team will be joining the women up in Westfield.

“We’ll let that play out over time,” Willis said. “Certainly I don’t want to say anything that may or may not be true or change, but we would love to have Indy Eleven as much as we can of their organization. We would love them.”

City leaders plan to take about 10 years to completely roll out the expansion.

Willis said the cost of the project could be “upwards of a couple of a billion dollars over the life of the project.”

He adds that there will be no new taxes created around Grand Park: “Your taxes are not going to go up.”

Most of the money will be from private investors, Willis said.

This story was originally published by WISH-TV at wishtv.com/news/local-news/westfield-mayor-grand-park-expansion.