A 25,000-capacity soccer stadium has been in the works to be built in Queens’ Willets Point neighborhood–making it NYC’s very first one–and new renderings have just been released!
The soccer stadium is part of a bigger project overall, which is set to include not only +40,000-square-feet-worth of public open space, but also a hotel and retail shops.
And the positive effects on the community will be astronomical.
Once complete, the project will create over 1,500 permanent jobs and more than 14,000 construction jobs. It will also include a new 650-seat standalone public school, and 2,500 affordable housing options–NYC’s largest 100% affordable housing project in 40 years.
New York City FC CEO Brad Sims stated to MLSsoccer.com:
I know that everyone’s looking forward to being in the new stadium. I think we’ve tried to tinker with things over the years to optimize the fan experience at Yankee Stadium and Citi Field to the best of our abilities. But there’s a lot of things that are kind of out of our control as a tenant.
And recently unveiled is The Cube: an immersive, seven story front door to the stadium.
The Cube is as dramatic of an entrance as it sounds and, according to Sims, is “unlike anything in any other soccer stadium or any other sports venue that we’ve seen.”
Serving as the focal point to the stadium, the immersive entrance will tower over seven stories above street level and feature 11,000-square-feet-worth of LED screens. Each screen will be customized for game day programming and will display art and other sights year-round.
Sims added:
Really, we want to blow people away. You’re at the start of your experience, as you’re entering or you’re walking into the facility. We think the vast majority of our fans are going to enter through the southwest, this main entrance…and we want this ‘wow’ moment when you’re coming in the stadium, that there really is this fantastic sense of arrival.
The stadium is on track to open in 2027, and NYCFC hopes to break ground on construction by this autumn.