June 27, 2019
ECTB Stadium (Capacity: 4,600)
Allentown, PA
Allentown Railers vs Quakertown Blazers
Final Score: 10 – 15
* Sporting events are no longer held here
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The Lehigh Valley is made up of three cities in the eastern part of Pennsylvania and the anchor city is Allentown. With a population of 118,000, it is the state’s third largest. Allentown has a similar history to many other Northeast cities: A successful start because of manufacturing and industrial work (iron products in this case). Then a downturn in the 1960s and 70s followed by attempted revitalization. The city has a AAA baseball team and before their modern home was built in 2008, Bicentennial Park existed. Dating back to the 1930s as Fairview Field, the stadium was rebuilt as a softball field in 1976, hosting a national tournament upon opening. Now it also serves baseball and each June and July, it is home to the Allentown Railers of the ACBL, a collegiate-summer league that has been around since 1967. Debuting in 2012, the Railers have had the league’s best regular-season record each of their seven seasons. They’ve won the playoff title in ’15, ’16 and ’17. While the rest of the ACBL teams play on a community or high school field, Allentown is the only one that plays in what could be qualified as a stadium. It is a quirky stadium, but a decaying one that is obviously not kept up.
Prestige Ranking: 1 out of 5
Location
ECTB Stadium is located in the South Side section of Allentown and this is an unassuming neighborhood. There are some housing developments mixed with some other business buildings, while closer to I-78 is a commercialized big-box/chain section. Near the stadium, there is a small sports bar and a place that sells cheesesteaks, which was not to my liking at all. Downtown is only a mile away and there are newly developed spots to go with a recently-built arena. Several food/drink establishments can be found here. From my perspective, Allentown doesn’t offer much of anything else as The America on Wheels museum is perhaps the best local attraction, which doesn’t say much.
Location Ranking: 4 out of 10
Accessibility / Parking
Route 22, I-476 and I-78 all provide fairly good access to the region. The easiest ride by far is from 78, where you follow Lehigh Street from Exit 57 to get to the ballpark. Coming from 22 is more of a pain because you need to drive through downtown, but there’s enough connectors to make it to 78. Recently, the facility lost most of their parking lot to a new transportation authority building. This leaves extremely limited parking for attendees as there is less than 100 spaces behind the ballpark and half of those spots are taken up by players and other personnel. Plus, the narrow lot is in prime foul-ball territory, so much so that I cringed every time there was one. Given that so few attend games, the handful of people who come should get a spot. The only other option was street parking and I would not be completely comfortable looking for one in the area.
Accessibility / Parking Ranking: 4.5 out of 8
Exterior
Before turning into the “parking lot”, there’s a nice ballpark sign. That’s about the end of the nice things at the stadium. The exterior features a look at the steel light poles and bleacher skeleton. Where paint is used, blue is the color and that is seen more on the few concession buildings around. There is a more permanent grandstand here and those stands are based on concrete. Both the press box and building underneath are quite plain.
Exterior Ranking: 2 out of 10
Concourse
Stadium grounds are protected by a chain-link fence and the person at the merchandise stand acts as the entrance as they collect $5 and stamp your hand. Behind and around the stadium structure at ground level is a concrete walkway and there is a concession built into the base of the seating bowl. It is nice that they have picnic tables as I did utilize one. Further around the concourse is the lone bathroom and it is an appallingly gross eyesore that looks like it has not been cleaned since the ballpark opened in 1976. Note that there is practically no cover if trying to dodge the elements, though at that point, I guess you would just go wait out any rain in your nearby car.
Concourse Ranking: 1 out of 5
Food
The food stand has more than I was expecting: Hot Dogs, Burgers, Fries and Chicken Tenders. This is in addition to an assortment of drinks and snacks.
Food Ranking: 3 out of 8
Interior
The first thing that stands out is the all-dirt infield as the stadium’s softball origins have not completely gone away. As for seating, there are three separate structures and two of them are connected. Behind home plate is decent as there is good height to the structure and the format is traditional with some curve to outer sections. It is remarkable how close the seats are to play and it makes for a neat perspective. A walkway splits lower, light-blue seats with chairs and the higher bleacher ones. Rows are tight, so finding a comfortable seat in the lower section usually involves putting your legs over the seat in front of you. Where bleachers exist for the rest of the park, a blue plastic butt pad makes it a bit more comfortable. Down the third base and first base side, are the separate stands and these feature wooden steps. Each stand features a straight-ahead view. The neighborhood setting creates a very quirky outfield wall as it is quite tall and even comes with protective netting at the top. True center is situated well to the right of normal and there is even a light fixture in play. The backdrop beyond the large green outfield wall isn’t anything special, but I did find it neat that the PPL building is visible as it peaks over the trees. This is the largest building in Allentown and you can see the flag that sits on top of it as well.
Interior Ranking: 4 out of 14
Scoreboard
The scoreboard does not work. At all. This is not an anomaly either and it’s one of the biggest complaints to ECTB, the organization that runs the place (more on that in “Other Stuff”). I initially thought that sun glare was causing issues on the black, basic board in left-field. Then as it got darker, I realized the only way of knowing the score and inning was to pay attention to the press box field announcer each half inning. It was very easy also to lose track of the count as the umpire never really said it, he just called balls and strikes. So bizarre.
Scoreboard Ranking: 0 out of 4
Displays
Earl F. Hunsicker is honored with his name in front of the Bicentennial Park sign out front and that is for his fundraising abilities during the renovation. There’s also a plaque for him on an outer wall, which is next to a much larger one that lists stadium contributors. The Railers have displays in the outfield and one is quite large as it is on the outfield wall and denotes Allentown as back-to-back ACBL champions. Nice, but I guess they didn’t consider what to do if/when they won a third straight in 2017. There’s also a much smaller 2015 league championship poster near the scoreboard as well.
Displays Ranking: 1.5 out of 6
Cost
Entry is $5 and parking is free. Concession prices are quite low as a soda costs $1, hot dog: $2 and a cheeseburger: $3.50
Cost Ranking: 8 out of 8
Fan Support and Atmosphere
There were 44 people in the stadium to watch the game. Given that games are generally just during the weekdays, I wouldn’t expect much more than that. Of those 44, it looked like most were friends or family as several of the players are local products. Despite the close ties, they offered very little support as early in the game, 2 people clapped for a base hit and about 10 of them clapped for a run. Needless to say, it was a quiet atmosphere and if it wasn’t for the periodic sound of air brakes from the nearby bus terminal, it actually was serene. Once the buses settled for the night, watching baseball in near complete quiet was a unique experience. Adding to that was the team’s broadcaster, Brian Brown. Like those on the field, Brian is young, learning and gaining great experience as he begins his career and sitting close enough within earshot, I thought he did a terrific job. He called the game like a pro, mixing in anecdotes, stories, game-calling, facts and statistics. He was never cheesy, except for one moment and it was so over the top that I found it fantastic. An Allentown home run led to his call of “Tickets please…as this ball as left the station!” followed by a couple blows on a wooden train whistle that he brought with him.
Fan Support Ranking: 0.5 out of 8
Atmosphere Ranking: 2.5 out of 14
Other Stuff
The original Bicentennial Park name comes from the fact that the reopening occurred on America’s 200th birthday….It is still commonly referred to as Bicentennial Park as the ECTB moniker comes from an acronym for a youth baseball organization that leases the ballpark through the year. The organization gets a good deal of heat from locals who lament stadium upkeep and how their tournaments are run. I agree with them on the upkeep part, especially given the scoreboard…..The Railers are a small outfit with no team website, thus there is no information on tickets, team history, etc. Just a schedule and roster. They do have a Facebook page that includes a radio broadcast…..Games are mainly played during the week as ECTB leases out the field to plenty of local leagues and their own run tournaments during the weekends…..Before the Railers, there were prior Allentown teams that played in the ACBL, including the Wings, who won five titles in six years…..Bicentennial Park was home to an independent league team with the Ambassadors playing in the Northeast League, here from 1997-2003.
Game
One game is not a fair evaluation of league quality, but these guys did not do the ACBL any favors. I witnessed a total of 10 official errors and eight of them were by Allentown. I know it’s an anomaly, given the announcer’s “Truly peculiar stuff!” call after the eight one, but still. The Railers couldn’t get past all those mistakes as they lost the game. There were 27 hits on top of all those errors AND there were 29 combined strikeouts, meaning that more than half of the game’s outs were by a K. Hard to digest how strange this game was and it ended 15-10 to Quakertown. One more fun note…in the box score, Quakertown has a “Hitman, B.” in the lineup. My immediate thought went to Bret “Hitman” Hart of old-school WWF lore. This Hitman’s name is Bill though and he lived up to it by going 3 for 6.
Stadium and Arena Visits 
