The Rays Are Leaving St. Pete. What Happens to Tropicana Field and the Gas Plant District Now?

After years of uncertainty over where the Tampa Bay Rays would ultimately call home, the picture became much clearer last week.

The Tampa City Council voted 4-3 Thursday to advance the financing agreement for a new Rays ballpark, followed Friday by a 5-2 vote from the Hillsborough County Commission approving the county's portion of the deal.

The proposed $2.3 billion ballpark is planned for the Hillsborough College Dale Mabry campus near Raymond James Stadium. The Rays are expected to contribute more than $1.3 billion and cover cost overruns, while Hillsborough County's contribution is approximately $796 million and the City of Tampa's is capped at $80 million.

The team is targeting April 2029 for the opening of the new stadium.

For Pinellas County, however, the bigger real estate story may be what the move leaves behind.

Despite the momentum across the bay, baseball at Tropicana Field isn't over.

The Rays returned to Tropicana Field for the 2026 season following repairs to damage caused by Hurricane Milton, and the team's agreement in St. Petersburg runs through the 2028 season.

That creates an unusual transition period.

For at least the next several seasons, Tropicana Field remains an active Major League Baseball stadium. At the same time, St. Petersburg is moving forward with plans for a future in which the Trop is no longer the centerpiece of the site.

That future is beginning to take shape through one of the largest redevelopment proposals in the city's history.

In July, St. Petersburg Mayor Ken Welch selected The Burg Bid, led by St. Petersburg-based Blake Investment Partners in partnership with Related Group, as the preferred proposal for redevelopment of the Historic Gas Plant District.

The proposal envisions approximately $8.1 billion in total development investment across the site.

The development team has offered $275 million for 58 acres of city-owned land, part of the larger approximately 86-acre Historic Gas Plant District.

Unlike previous redevelopment concepts that revolved around building a new Rays stadium in St. Petersburg, The Burg Bid is designed around a different centerpiece: a major public park and mixed-use district.

At the center of the plan is a proposed 13-acre Samuel Davis Park, surrounded by housing, offices, hotels, retail, restaurants, entertainment and cultural uses.

The vision also includes a Museum Row anchored by a new home for the Woodson African American Museum of Florida, along with workforce development, small-business resources, public gathering spaces and potential transportation improvements.

Housing is another major component.

The Burg Bid proposes more than 3,600 income-restricted affordable and workforce housing units over the life of the project, with approximately half planned within the Historic Gas Plant District and the remainder at other locations throughout St. Petersburg.

Eventually, the Trop is expected to come down.

Mayor Welch has said the city's long-term direction is to demolish Tropicana Field as redevelopment of the district progresses.

But that doesn't necessarily mean demolition begins the moment the Rays play their final game.

The redevelopment is expected to occur in phases, and portions of the site outside the stadium footprint could potentially move forward while the Rays are still playing at Tropicana Field.

That could create a scenario in which the transformation of the Gas Plant District begins before the stadium itself disappears.

For developers, contractors, brokers and other commercial real estate professionals, that distinction matters. This isn't necessarily a project that starts sometime after 2028. Pieces of the redevelopment could begin taking shape earlier as negotiations, approvals, infrastructure planning and individual projects progress.

There is one important distinction between the Rays stadium situation and the Gas Plant redevelopment.

The Rays' move to Tampa just cleared two major governmental votes.

The Burg Bid still has significant steps ahead.

Selection as the preferred developer does not constitute final approval of the redevelopment. St. Petersburg and the development team must negotiate the detailed agreements governing the project, and those agreements ultimately require approval from City Council before the development can fully move forward.

That process will determine important details including land transactions, infrastructure, community benefits, project phasing and development commitments.

In other words, the vision is enormous — but it remains a vision under negotiation.

For decades, the future of the Historic Gas Plant District and the future of the Rays were essentially the same conversation.

They no longer are.

With the Rays now moving toward a new stadium in Hillsborough County, St. Petersburg has an opportunity to plan the Gas Plant District without designing the property around Major League Baseball.

That could prove to be one of the most consequential changes to downtown St. Petersburg in decades.

The site sits immediately west of the city's downtown core and represents a massive amount of developable land in a market where similarly sized urban redevelopment opportunities are exceptionally rare.

If The Burg Bid ultimately moves forward substantially as proposed, thousands of new residences, commercial space, hospitality, parks and cultural uses could fundamentally extend the footprint of downtown St. Petersburg to the west.

And the transformation would unfold over many years.

The next two years will be particularly interesting.

The Rays are expected to continue playing at Tropicana Field through the 2028 season while simultaneously preparing for their planned 2029 opening in Tampa.

Meanwhile, St. Petersburg and The Burg Bid team can continue negotiating the future of the Historic Gas Plant District.

For Pinellas County's commercial real estate industry, that means the end of the Rays era in St. Petersburg isn't simply the loss of a professional sports franchise.

It could also mark the beginning of one of the largest redevelopment projects Pinellas County has ever seen.

PCRE will continue tracking the Historic Gas Plant District as negotiations progress, including development agreements, project phasing, land transactions and opportunities connected to the redevelopment.