Minute Maid Park (Houston, Texas)
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Raven
N 29° 45.410 W 095° 21.324
15R E 272242 N 3294165
Minute Maid Park is a retractable-roofed ballpark stadium in downtown Houston, Texas. Opened in 2000, it is the home of the Major League Baseball's Houston Astros team.
Waymark Code: WMGT6Q
Location: Texas, United States
Date Posted: 04/07/2013
Views: 10
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"Also known as The Ballpark at Union Station, Enron Field, and Astros Field, Minute Maid Park was Houston's first retractable-roofed stadium, protecting fans and athletes from Houston's notoriously humid weather as did its predecessor, the Astrodome, but also allowing fans to enjoy outdoor baseball during favorable weather. The ballpark also features a grass field, compared to the Astrodome's artificial AstroTurf, which was generally disliked by professional baseball players. The largest entrance to the park is inside what was once Houston's Union Station, and the left-field side of the stadium features a railway as homage to the site's history. The train moves along a track on top of the length of the exterior wall beyond left field whenever an Astros player hits a home run, and/or when the Astros win a game. The engine's tender, traditionally used to carry coal, is filled with giant oranges in tribute to Coca Cola's Minute Maid's most famous product, orange juice. The ballpark has 5,095 club seats and 63 luxury suites.
The ballpark was first christened as Enron Field on April 7, 2000, with naming rights sold to the Houston energy and financial trading company in a 30 year, $100 million deal. Astros management faced a public relations nightmare when the energy corporation went bankrupt in the midst of one of the biggest corporate scandals in American history in 2001, and they bought back the remainder of Enron's thirty years of naming rights for $2.1 million, rechristening the ballpark as Astros Field on February 7, 2002. The field was unofficially known as "The Field Formerly Known As Enron" by fans and critics alike, in wake of the Enron scandal. On June 5, 2002, Houston-based Minute Maid, the fruit-juice subsidiary of The Coca-Cola Company, acquired the naming rights to the stadium for 28 years at an estimated price of $170 million."