From Staff Reports 

ASHEVILLE — The UNC Asheville stadium proposal unveiled on June 13 confirmed “a a rumor that had circulated for months” — and raised “many more questions,”  the website AVL Watchdog reported on June 23.

“Plans for the property – from impact on local economy to developer’s identity – remain opaque,” AVL Watchdog stated.

“UNCA’s announcement confirmed the university’s  plans to build a soccer stadium on the land currently occupied by 45 acres of woods south of its main campus,” the website stated.

“The plan, developed in collaboration with the amateur soccer club Asheville City SC, calls for a 5,000-seat stadium surrounded by retail and market-rate housing, to be built over the remainder of this decade,” AVL Watchdog noted.

“It would be followed by an as-yet-unannounced project on university property on the other side of Broadway Street. Both properties are part of the school’s Millennial Campus holdings, a designation that allows for public-private partnerships typically outlawed on campuses in the UNC System.

“Just as the plan’s announcement has answered one much-asked question — what is to become of the woods? — it has, in turn, unleashed many more, none of which the school has been keen to answer,’ AVL Watchdog stated.