On days when night games are scheduled at Wrigley Field, it should be easy for the work crews to put in a full day's work on the construction project before things get busy in the neighborhood. Monday was one of those days, as BCB's David Sameshima reports:
I again arrived much later than I had intended. I had planned to catch the work in progress before they started shutting down for the game. I ended up arriving at just after 4:00 p.m., as work was winding down. It did end up being very interesting as I witnessed the pregame preparations over by Gate D.There were actually two fans already in line at Gate F when I arrived. I then saw concession workers filling the Sheffield Avenue sidewalk, around the alley across from the ballpark. There is a non public gate (Gate A) on the Sheffield side of Gate D. This entrance is used as the access gate for the visiting team bus. Due to the construction, this gate is also being used for ballpark workers. In order to keep the construction gate clear, this line is forced to continue across the street.While I was there, a second garbage truck arrived. Immediately afterwards, a visiting team bus arrived. There was an interesting ballet, as the bus backed in and the first garbage truck departed. Then the second garbage truck moved over to the where the first garbage truck was parked, to clear the space in front of the construction gate. Concession workers had to remain waiting across the street as the visiting team bus unloaded at Gate A.Not much construction work to document on this visit, but I did walk around to take photos of how they secured the work site before the game. They were attempting to move as much of their equipment underneath the right field bleachers as possible to keep a path clear along Sheffield. Some of the workers took the opportunity to check out the view through Gate Q, as they were packing up. I supplied Al with timestamps on the photos, so you can see how late they continued to work.I did make it over to left field. I did take photos so you can see how the netting is set up to protect the left field video board during batting practice. There were ballhawks out on Waveland Avenue, but I don't think anything came out to them while I was there.
David will be at the ballpark again today so we'll have more photos here tomorrow.