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Atlanta Falcons’ new stadium set to take center stage this weekend

August 25, 2017  - By

Mercedes-Benz Stadium will open its doors to the public for the first time Aug. 26, and boy, are fans going to see a show. And not just the game on the field.

While the focus will be on the matchup between the Falcons and the Arizona Cardinals for Atlanta’s preseason home opener, fans will finally get to step foot in the new, eye-catching addition to the Atlanta skyline.

Here’s a look at a few of the highlights.

The 71,000-seat stadium — now the home of the Atlanta Falcons and Atlanta United FC — is a work of art.

Speaking of art, look at this sentinel standing right in front of the stadium.

That falcon statue weighs in at 73,000 pounds! Talk about making a statement.

The $1.5 billion stadium took more than 27,000 tons of structural steel to build, according to an article on the Marietta Daily Journal.

The Field

FieldTurf will be the official playing surface at the stadium. But the partnership between Mercedes-Benz Stadium and FieldTurf doesn’t stop there. The turf company will also be surfacing the indoor practice field at the team’s complex in Flowery Branch, Ga.

“We are proud to have FieldTurf as our official surfacing partner for Mercedes-Benz Stadium,” said AMB Sports & Entertainment President Rich McKay. “We’ve been partners with FieldTurf for over 14 years and when looking at turf for our new facilities there was no other choice that made sense for us.”

The installations will be FieldTurf’s Revolution 360 surface. Revolution 360 was subjected to Penn State University’s Sports Surface Research Center’s aggressive 150,000 cycle Lisport Wear Testing and received a perfect 10 – 10 “good”, no “hair-splitting”, no “fractured”, no “complete splitting.”

To give fans an up-close look at how the field was put in, the Falcons released this time-lapse video of the process:

This surface is already in use at several facilities, including Gillette Stadium and CenturyLink Field.

Can’t forget that roof

But here’s the kicker: There are still some kinks that need to be worked out.

Mercedes-Benz Stadium officials still can’t put a timetable on when the roof will be fully operational, according to an article on Fox Sports. The article went on to say that the roof will be closed for Saturday’s game, but officials state the roof will be operational — where it will be able to open or close in 11 minutes — for games this Fall.

Being green in a city of red

In addition to all the incredible tech and breathtaking architectural features, there’s still one more important feature to address: The stadium’s green practices.

According to a Forbes article, the stadium will feature a 600,000-gallon cistern to gather rainwater and reuse it, and 4,000 solar panels around the complex.

Now that’s a big scoreboard

It is a 1,075-feet long by 58-feet tall wraparound, halo-style scoreboard. The scoreboard is the largest non-transparent LED video display in the world, 6th largest LED video display in the world of any kind.

According to Daktronics — makers of the mammoth display — the display is three times larger than the next largest video display in the NFL, and 27-times larger than the Georgia Dome video display. If you were to roll it out it would be the 10th tallest building in the U.S.

Looking down the line, the stadium will also take on events such as the college football’s SEC Championship Game, the state football championships for Georgia high schools and the Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl.

Mercedes-Benz Stadium is also scheduled to host the College Football Playoff Championship game in January, the Super Bowl in 2019 and the NCAA Men’s Final Four in 2020.

The new stadium is next door to its predecessor — the Georgia Dome. The Dome is scheduled to be imploded at 7:30 a.m. on Nov. 20 and will be replaced with 13 acres of parking and tailgating space.

This article is tagged with , and posted in Football/Soccer, Top Stories
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About the Author:

Kelly Limpert is the former digital media content producer for North Coast Media. Limpert completed her undergraduate degree at Ohio University where she earned a Bachelor of Science in Journalism from the E.W. Scripps School of Journalism. She specifically creates content for North Coast Media’s Golfdom, Landscape Management and Athletic Turf digital properties including eNewsletters, social media and websites.

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