STRUCTURAL ENGINEERING Stadium Updated for Washington Nationals

• Published in: Civil engineering (New York, N.Y. 1983) N.Y. 1983), 2005-06, Vol.75 (6), p.16-18
• Main Author: Binns, Jessica
• Format: Magazinearticle
• Language: English
• ISSN: 0885-7024

Robert E Kennedy Stadium, or, as it's generally referred to, RFx, the venerable sports venue in Washington, D.C., is once again, in accordance with its original design, providing a playing field for two different sports. But one of these sports did not figure in that original design. Built in the late 1950s to accommodate the Washington Senators baseball team, which moved to Texas in the 1970s, and the Washington Redskins, which today play at a different venue in the metropolitan area, RFK is now the home of Major League Baseball's newest franchise, the Washington Nationals-formerly the Montreal Expos. But it is also the home of D.C. United, a Major League Soccer (MLS) team that has been playing there since 1996, the year the Redskins relocated to what is now FedEx Field. The arrival of the Nationals placed some imposing demands on the stadium; although it was designed so that seating configurations could be changed for baseball and foot ball, the conversion was to take place only as the baseball season gave way to the beginning of the football season. However, since the baseball and soccer seasons run concurrently, the seating must be converted roughly 20 times over the course of several months, necessitating innovative design work and engineering from the team responsible for ushering the storied sports venue into the 21st century.