Debuting in 2014, the Grand Park Sports Campus features 26 baseball and softball diamonds, 31 multipurpose fields for soccer, football, and lacrosse on 400 acres in , Indiana, in north of Indianapolis.
The centerpiece of the sports complex is the 370,000-square-foot indoor Grand Park Events Center, which opened in the summer of 2016. It features three full-sized professional turf fields, a mezzanine concourse for viewing, a restaurant, retail space, locker facilities, office and meeting space, and administrative offices. The multi-use space can be used for trade shows, live entertainment, conventions, and special event programming.
Nearby, the Pacers Athletic Center serves as an indoor basketball and volleyball facility. Indianapolis restauranteur Johnathan Byrd privately built the Pacers’ center, which opened in January 2016. Eight basketball courts, one of which is NBA regulation, four shoot-a-way machines, a mezzanine level for viewing, and a full-service restaurant fills the 88,000 square foot facility. The privately own the facility, which they purchased from Byrd in 2017.
Rounding out the sports complex are the baseball and soccer venues. The baseball complex has 26 diamonds, 8 of which are synthetic and all of which have outdoor lighting. The soccer complex is home to 31 fields, 7 made of synthetic turf, and 8 are lighted for late-night games.
Abundant green space, more than 10 miles of pedestrian and bicycle trails, and the largest trailhead on the corridor surround the sports complex. The campus has hosted events from youth sports championships to NCAA Division I and Olympic level national championships. In 2018, Grand Park signed a 10-year contract with the to bring the team’s annual training camp to the complex during the months of July and August.
Reports suggest that Grand Park has been a boon for Hamilton County tourism in general and Westfield in particular. Nearly 150,000 nightly hotel rooms a year are booked by visitors attending events at the sports complex. In 2017, 1.8 million visitors came to Grand Park, making it the county’s top tourism attraction, accounting for approximately 15 percent of all visits.
Critics condemned Westfield mayor Andy Cook for using taxpayer dollars to fund the $49 million project. Cook initially said the Events Center would be privately funded before introducing a measure to back its financing with tax dollars at a cost of $26 million. He also claimed the venue would draw more than $2.3 billion in revenue over several decades, which has not materialized. Furthermore, Cook agreed to a $1.1 million three-year agreement to pay part of the Colt’s cost to rent a nearby Cambria Hotel during training season after insisting the city would not provide funding.
Grand Park has hosted its share of noteworthy sporting events. Indeed, even during the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic thousands from around the county flocked to Grand Park during a four-day girls basketball tournament. More than 200 teams played 600 games at the complex. Even by conservative estimates, more than 6,000 players took the court during a four-day span.
Commercial growth around the sports complex has developed slowly as Grand Park’s reputation as a sports destination has increased. Since 2014, a dozen or so businesses around the venue have opened. These include a mix of hotels, gas stations, fast-food joints, and restaurants. Future projects include a partnership between Westfield Schools and the . This joint venture aims to build a $35 million YMCA with an Olympic-size natatorium near Grand Park by 2020.
Adjacent to Grand Park along its northern boundary lays a $500-million golf course community. A local developer involved in the initial plans for Grand Park purchased the land and developed the community, while Indiana golf course architect laid out the plans for the Championship Golf Course or Executive Par 3 course.
In early 2021, the city of Westfield and Grand Park announced that they were opening the recreational facility to commercial and institutional organizations for use as a research lab and product testing ground. Four companies are initiating the project. They include Awre Sports, headquartered in Charlotte, North Carolina—a company that provides baseball venues with a live-streaming platform, called PitchAware, which features advanced game analysis. Awre intends to use Grand Park as a research and development to expand its application to field sports. A second company, Zionsville-based RefsReps, has targeted Grand Park to create educational and interactive videos to train new and returning sports officials. Spotz, based in Madison, Wisconsin, has partnered with Grand Park to further enhance its online platform for booking community gathering places. Finally, New York City startup ZoneIn will work at the Grand Park hub to refine its sports nutrition application that is personalized to each user’s physical fitness and training schedule. Such partnerships are intended to fulfill Grand Park’s potential as an economic development tool as well as a sports and events campus.
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