Ballpark Village Gets (Temporary) Tenant -- the Boy Scouts

By Sarah Fenske Thu., Aug. 19 2010 at 7:45 AM

Categories: Go!

So here's the real plan: If we build a new stadium, eventually, a Boy Scout-themed tractor-trailer will come and park in the giant gaping vacant lot across the street.

Finally! Someone found a use for Ballpark Village, the long-stalled "development" across the street from Busch Stadium: a parking lot!

Okay, so that doesn't sound like a huge improvement from the site's current deployment as a parking lot/softball field. But bear with us: This weekend, the 40-acre site will actually play host to a tractor-trailer barnstorming the country in celebration of the Boy Scouts of America's 100th anniversary, called Adventure Base 100.

Once parked, the 18-wheeler opens up into a 10,000-square-foot interactive campus, complete with a ropes course, an "IMAX-like" video with "a multi-sensory experience" (read: a movie on a really large screen, plus aromatherapy), and a traveling exhibit from the National Scouting Museum.

And where better to set up camp than a vacant lot -- oops, Ballpark Village?

Really, it's a match made in heaven. A tractor-trailer needs a place to park. And now that Ballpark Village has been pushed back time and again, until just about everybody's given up on Bill DeWitt III ever doing anything, the site needs a purpose. This is symbiosis!

And, unlike Busch Stadium, Adventure Base 100 is free, according to the Boys Scouts of America. It'll be open tomorrow from 12 p.m. to 6 p.m., on Saturday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., and on Sunday from just 10 a.m. to 12 p.m. -- unless, of course, we can persuade them to set up camp and stay for awhile.

Come on! It'll help the Cards save face. Shouldn't a good scout be prepared to take one for the team?