LAKE FOREST, Ill. — The Chicago Bears’ plans for a new domed stadium have shifted again.
The team is now focused on building a stadium in Arlington Heights, Illinois, where the franchise owns the 326-acre property that previously housed the Arlington International Racecourse. This development comes just over a month after the Bears said they were exploring Arlington Heights and the Chicago lakefront south of the current site of Soldier Field as options.
“Over the last few months, we have made significant progress with the leaders in Arlington Heights, and look forward to continuing to work with state and local leaders on making a transformative economic development project for the region a reality,” the Bears said in a statement obtained by ESPN.
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The Bears purchased the land in Arlington Heights for $197.2 million in September 2021 but have not begun developing the site, which was expected to feature a multibillion-dollar stadium project and include restaurants, retail space and real estate. The team began exploring options for a new stadium beyond Arlington Heights in the summer of 2023 when they announced that those plans were “at risk” as negotiations over property taxes reached a $100 million impasse.
Lat month, the village of Arlington Heights approved a deal to open a formal review of the Bears’ $5 billion plan to build a stadium in the suburb.
Bears team president and CEO Kevin Warren said in April that the team’s goal is to begin construction on a new stadium in 2025. Bears chairman George McCaskey said that private equity “may be utilized as part of our stadium construction financing plan” but that the team has yet to make a decision on that front.
“Yes, my goal still remains, to be able to move dirt around in 2025, which is important because there’s a lot of preconstruction work that needs to go into these projects, whether you’re at the museum campus, Michael Reese [former hospital site] or downtown, to get things ready to go, and so we’re only one-quarter of the way through the year,” Warren said at the NFL’s annual league meeting.
The Chicago Tribune first reported the news of the Bears’ plans to focus on Arlington Heights.
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