Inter Miami fans get sneak peek at new Fort Lauderdale stadium. Here’s what they saw
Inter Miami CF Stadium opened its gates for the first time Tuesday night, as more than 3,000 season-ticket holders attended an open training session to watch the team prepare for Saturday’s long-awaited home-opening match against the Los Angeles Galaxy.
In the span of eight months, a modern, colorful 19,000-seat stadium with club suites and state-of-art video boards sprung up in place of the demolished Lockhart Stadium, which was abandoned and overgrown with weeds after 40 years as the home of the Fort Lauderdale Strikers, Miami Fusion, and Florida Atlantic University football team.
“Welcome to your home!” coach Diego Alonso said to the black-and-pink-clad fans, first in English and then in Spanish. “Everything is possible. A championship is possible. We can do this together.”
Team captain and goalkeeper Luis Robles got a huge ovation, and then told the fans: “We need 90 minutes of energy and passion and we’ll get three points together.”
All three supporters’ groups – Southern Legion, The Siege and Vice City 1896 (the year Miami was founded) chanted and waved giant flags from the south stands. During games they will be in the standing-only north stands, not far from the Heineken Garden.
The new stadium is part of a $140 million, 64-acre privately-funded soccer complex that includes a 50,000 square-foot team training facility, one of the largest in Major League Soccer. It has locker rooms, gym, an underwater treadmill, cafeteria, offices, meeting rooms and media work space. The grounds include six lighted natural grass soccer fields and a turf field with 1,500 seats for high school and community sporting events.
Inter Miami plans to play its first two seasons (maybe three) at the stadium until its proposed Miami Freedom Park venue is done. The Fort Lauderdale complex will serve as its permanent training ground. It will also house the club’s minor-league United Soccer League team and the youth academy. Foreign teams have toured the facilities and are expected to use the site for training and friendly matches.
Season-ticket holder Albert Gamarra of Weston felt nostalgic as he looked around. “It’s been 40 years since I was here with my father for the Strikers games,” he said. “This is a big deal. I love this venue. We waited a long time for this.”
Looking on like a proud father Tuesday was Don Lockerbie of Miami-based The Parker Company, a global leader in sports venues including Olympics, World Cups, and over 400 stadiums.
Lockerbie, who largely oversaw Inter Miami’s soccer complex construction, is familiar with the Lockhart site. His company was hired to renovate the former stadium in 1997 by Fusion owner Ken Horowitz 93 days before the season opener when the team’s deal with the Orange Bowl fell through. With a $5 million budget back then, Lockerbie added 13,000 seats to bring Lockhart to 20,000, expanded the press box and added suite tents.
This time, the project was much more elaborate and costly.
“I’m excited to say we’ll be opening Saturday and feeling really good about where we are,” Lockerbie said. “It’s a race to the finish. We knew it was a challenge to get this all done in eight months, but we also believed it was a challenge that could be done. We have a list of things we still have the rest of Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday to get ready. There will be a big cleanup to get it spic and span so we’re proud to open it.”
Lockerbie said he is personally responsible for “F, F, and E” – furniture, fixtures and equipment. Thousands of pieces have been in storage in Doral for months, and they are making their way up to the stadium over the next three days.
“F, F and E are always the last to go in any stadium, any building, whether you build a hotel, a stadium, a movie theater, you wait until construction is done and things are clean and lockable, and in comes the furniture,” Lockerbie said.
Half of the training facility is complete. Th other half will be done next week. The team has been using the gym, locker rooms, dining area, team medical area, and tactics room. Still to be completed are the visiting locker rooms and staff offices.
There is still plenty of work to be done by the weekend, but Lockerbie is confident the stadium will be ready for its debut.
“A lot of times, the best day a stadium has is its first day because the spectators come in and make it their own,” he said. “I’ve been involved in stadiums for 40 years, and I couldn’t be prouder. We always knew this was the first home for the team. It will always be that. We’ve attacked it as though it’s the stadium they’ll be proud to play in and win in for a long time. Whatever happens in Miami happens, but for right now, this is the only team stadium, next to the training center. It’s a great home.”
This story was originally published March 10, 2020 at 9:00 PM.