The owners of the Boston Red Sox have snapped up a parking garage on Lansdowne Street opposite Fenway Park, paying $10.5 million for the potential redevelopment play.
"I'm not sure what exactly they have in mind for the property, but they could expand it, go up, a lot of different things," said John Rosenthal, the Hub developer who sold the garage that Sox sluggers sometimes hit with out-of-the-park home runs. "It has great potential."
The garage sale stems from a partnership Rosenthal struck six years ago with the Sox that paved the way for his $450 million Fenway Center project, set to break ground this year.
Under current zoning, the two-story garage could be converted into an eight-story building — about twice the height of the iconic Green Monster across Lansdowne.
The Sox were tight-lipped yesterday about what they'll do. "It will be operated as a parking garage for the foreseeable future," Sox spokeswoman Zineb Curran said.
Marc Ganis, a Chicago-based sports business expert, said it's a no-brainer for the team to take control of the 340-space garage.
"If you are the Red Sox and you are landlocked, so to speak, anytime a property adjacent to the stadium becomes available you have to buy it, even if you don't have any immediate uses for it," Ganis said. "It's both an offensive move to expand and a defensive move to prevent competing businesses from moving in."
Rosenthal bought the garage for $2.5 million in 1993 and planned to redevelop it. But, facing opposition from the Sox owners, who wanted to protect historic Fenway Park, Rosenthal shifted his project to Sox-owned parking lots and Pike air-rights parcels on the other side of Brookline Avenue.
Rosenthal and the Sox remain partners on a Pike air-rights parcel behind the garage, "so that could be a future development site."
Rosenthal's highly visible Stop Handgun Violence billboard covers the back of the garage along the Pike. An easement will allow the billboard to stay, but Rosenthal expects it to eventually find a new home.
Ganis said that with the salary savings alone from last year's big trade with the Los Angeles Dodgers, the Red Sox can afford to take it slow on the garage.
"The debt service on $10.5 million isn't very much," he said. "Getting rid of Carl Crawford for half a season took care of that ... and they got something that will last forever. They should send the Dodgers a thank-you card."
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