MEMPHIS, Tenn. — Thursday, August 18th, Liberty park held a hard hat tour to show the progress on the new Memphis Sports and Events Center.
Located at Liberty Park, which used to be known as the Memphis Fairgrounds, the Sports and Events center will be a 227,000 square foot space that will include indoor basketball and volleyball and will be used for other sports, such as, wrestling, gymnastics, and cheerleading.
This space will also include a café and an area for concessions.
"When we looked at the history of this area, one thing was always consistent, family, fun, entertainment and sports. There were a lot of people over the years who said, what are we gonna do with the Fairgrounds, and people came up with various ideas, and when the Strickland administration decided to kind of take another crack at this nut in 2017, we said, you know what, why try to go a different direction? Lean in to what's already there and what's been there. So, that's really been the driving force behind what we've done," said Mary Claire Borys, City of Memphis HCD Administrator of Strategic Initiatives.
General Manager of MSEC, Antonio Perez, who was Director of Youth Basketball Programming for the Memphis Grizzlies for 15 years, said this facility provides a venue that the city just hasn't otherwise had.
Perez said their team is working close with Memphis Tourism and Memphis Sports Council, and although there have been sports events in the past, Memphis Sports and Events Center will allow for sports events on a greater scale.
"So now we're on a task of letting all these organizers around the country know, Memphis is a great destination for your event. What it does, is in the way of proximity in the country, we're centrally located. The DC teams that wanna go to Seattle, the LA teams that wanna go to New York, this is a great part of the country for them to convene," said Perez.
The Memphis Sports and Events center is predicted to open this November.
