Developers Release Plans for Auburn Sports Park
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Plans to convert the Auburn Auction Park into a new multi-purpose sports facility have been revealed.
A development group operating as Auburn Sports Group LLC has unveiled designs for a campus that will include: 16 basketball/volleyball courts, a domed indoor facility, eight baseball/softball fields and three artificial turf soccer/football fields. A web page indicates the park is set to open in “early summertime 2022.”
The facility is located along I-69, less than a 30-minute drive from downtown Fort Wayne. The transfer of ownership concludes a 12-year run in which the property belonged to Auctions America, which staged high profile vehicle sales there.
The development is a big one in a process that seemed to gather momentum last year, when a Fort Wayne-based developer submitted its application to construct the Auburn Sports Complex with the Auburn Plan Commission. The property, at that point, had been up for sale for about two years.
Details on the most recent transaction were not immediately available, but the most recent sale of the property, in 2010, is recorded at a value of $4.25 million.
The new project will entail $42 million in investment, with millions more expected to come from associated support businesses and stores that are anticipated on property surrounding the sports facilities. Developers expect to host regional and national tournaments and sports camps, and the park will be open for use by area clubs and teams. ASG projects the project will create 200 new jobs and add about $1 million to property tax rolls.
For more than 50 years, hundreds of thousands of visitors have descended on the auction park for its auctions of high-end antique and classic vehicles. The site has also been the annual home of a highly attended Labor Day classic car auction.