Beckham’s Inter Miami soccer team wants to train in Fort Lauderdale

Fort Lauderdale’s Lockhart Stadium has a long history of soccer and is now proposed as the training grounds for David Beckham’s Inter Miami Major League Soccer team.

The logo for Inter Miami, which is the shortened version of Club Internacional de Futbol Miami
The logo for Inter Miami, which is the shortened version of Club Internacional de Futbol Miami

The club, represented by Tripp Scott attorney Stephanie Toothaker, sent an unsolicited proposal to the city of Fort Lauderdale to turn the 1959-era stadium into an 18,000 seat, state-of-the art venue. The club says an engineering assessment found the stadium does not meet code requirements, including those associated with the Americans with Disabilities Act. Inter Miami would also add a 30,000- to 32,000-square foot building with locker rooms, weight training facilities, dining areas and administrative offices.

The club expects the site would have 80 full-time staff members, including 30 soccer players.

While the club will ultimately play at Miami Freedom Park, which is being developed just east of Miami International Airport, the training facility would be a boost to the Uptown Urban Village Project in Fort Lauderdale’s Cypress Creek area. The area hosts 70,000 employees and offers the opportunity for transit-oriented development near the Cypress Creek Tri Rail station. There have been plans over the decades to develop the station’s sprawling parking lot on the east side of Andrews Avenue, but they have never come to fruition.

Inter Miami indicated it will help Fort Lauderdale’s plan to reactivate the stadium area with a public park, playground, jogging trail and dog park.

There have been a couple of proposals for water parks on land near the stadium. Schlitterbahn’s plan was derailed by a lawsuit by Premiere Parks, which owns Wet ‘n’ Wild near West Palm Beach. In September, however, Premiere ended its plan for a Fort Lauderdale water park. One popular venue in the area is Xtreme Action Park, which offers a half-mile go kart track, a sports performance training center, laser tag and an array of games.

A key economic engine in the neighborhood is Fort Lauderdale Executive Airport, which is one of the nation’s busiest general aviation airports.

Lockhart stadium was built originally for high schools sports, but in 1977 became the home for the Fort Lauderdale Strikers of the North American Soccer League. It laster hosted the Miami Fusion Major League Soccer team. A second iteration of the Strikers played more recently at the stadium, but moved to Central Broward Regional Park. The key assets of the team were sold for $5,100 at a court-ordered auction in 2017.

“The vast history of soccer in South Florida has deep roots in Fort Lauderdale dating back to the original Strikers of the 70’s and 80’s, the Miami Fusion of the 90’s and early 2000’s as well as the recent clubs that have called Lockhart Stadium their home,” Paul McDonough, Inter Miami’s sporting director, said in a news release. “It is a privilege to be able to present a sustainable proposal that honors that history and revitalizes the area. Our training facility will serve all of South Florida’s soccer community and provide amateur and professional athletes the opportunity to achieve their goals both on and off the field.”

The site will have several soccer fields and accommodate a youth academy and a United Soccer League Team. The academy will provide more than 120 local athletes with a fully funded opportunity to train and develop their soccer skills as they pursue professional or collegiate soccer careers.  The academy’s teams will range from ages 12 to 19.

“The most important pillar of our legacy is our youth academy, where future players will have the opportunity to train alongside the professionals and aspire to one day represent our community in front of their hometown crowd,” McDonough said. “This proposal will establish our daily soccer operations in a centralized location that caters to youth players from all of South Florida, including Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties.”

The team is expected to kick off in the 2020 season, possibly at Marlins Ballpark since Freedom Park isn’t expected to be completed by then.

You May Also Like
Reaching Out

I know that Stephen Garber knows people. The president of Third Level is a seasoned expert on change management, relationship building and quality-of-life issues. He is an international executive coach,

Read More
Stephen Garber
SOUTH FLORIDA BUSINESS & WEALTH GOES 2.0

This is the time and this is the page when the new editor-in-chief typically would tell you to get ready for a new SFBW experience—but since you’ve seen the cover,

Read More
Are Your Salespeople Taking Shortcuts?

Connor, a software sales rep, had been having a rough day. He’d been bombarded with questions from several customers and gotten behind on work he needed to finish before the

Read More
COVID and the Commercial Sector

[vc_row css_animation=”” row_type=”row” use_row_as_full_screen_section=”no” type=”full_width” angled_section=”no” text_align=”left” background_image_as_pattern=”without_pattern”][vc_column width=”2/3″][vc_column_text] For South Florida’s vigorous commercial real estate sector, there is a Grand Canyon-size fissure between market conditions on March 1 and

Read More
Other Posts
Andare Residences by Pininfarina Breaking Ground on Las Olas

Delivery of completed units is expected to take 24 to 28 months after construction begins.

Read More
Seacoast Bank Opens New Branch in Weston

The expansion is intended to expand service to Seacoast’s customers and broaden its footprint in Broward.

Read More
FC Barcelona Relocates U.S. Headquarters to Miami Amid Surge in Soccer Popularity

The Miami Downtown Development Authority announced the move last week.

Read More
Opening this Fall: The Omni Fort Lauderdale Hotel

Omni Hotels & Resorts will bring its first property in this market to the Broward County Convention Center.

Read More