Hoofbeats Give Way to Demolition Equipment at Famed Baltimore Race Track

The one hundred and fiftieth operating of the Preakness Stakes Saturday Might 17 marked the tip of an period at Baltimore’s Pimlico Race Course, with the observe’s growing older amenities set to be demolished as a part of a $400-million redevelopment program.

Clark Building Group will oversee demolition of Pimlico’s 65-year-old clubhouse, horse barns and different buildings underneath a $14.3-million assured most value contract with the Maryland Stadium Authority. Earlier this 12 months, Clark, marketed commerce bid packages for website and structural demolition, hazmat abatement, erosion and sediment management, electrical and water, pest management and different providers, with 35% MBE participation aim. In October 2024, the state contracted with Clark for about $900,000 in preconstruction work.

Demolition exercise is scheduled to ramp up this summer time, following relocation of the remaining horses occupying Pimlico’s current stables. Building will then start on a program that goals to make the observe a year-round vacation spot, with greater than 100 race days, together with the signature Preakness, the normal “second jewel” in thoroughbred racing’s Triple Crown.

Roughly 40 new buildings will occupy the revitalized 117-acre Pimlico Race Course, together with a brand new clubhouse/occasion area with a seating capability of 5,000, and a design impressed by the unique grand Gothic-style clubhouse constructed when Pimlico opened in 1870. Pimlico’s new horse barns will take an analogous method, housing 400 horses and offering area for non-race-related occasions.

A proposal to rotate the Pimlico observe 30 levels was discarded, a call that saves an estimated $30 million in building prices and accelerates the development timeline, setting the stage for the Preakness to return to Pimlico in 2027. Subsequent 12 months’s race will probably be held at Laurel Park, south of Baltimore.

First run at Pimlico in 1873, the Preakness has been held on the storied observe yearly since 1909. This 12 months’s remaining race offered some further drama, with Journalism making a dramatic stretch run to win by a half-length. Secretariat holds the file for quickest Preakness time, successful the 1973 version of the 1-3/16 mile race in 1:53:00.

In a associated venture, Maryland will buy a 328-acre farm in Carroll County to help expanded racing at Pimlico. A $110-million allocation accredited final 12 months by the state legislature will fund building of a brand new state-of-the artwork coaching facility that originally will home 800 horses, with provisions for growth as wanted.

Pimlico joins renovation packages introduced or underway on the Triple Crown’s different two host tracks. At Belmont Park on Lengthy Island, AECOM Tishman is greater than midway by a three-year, $455-million rebuild that features a new five-level 275,000-sq-ft complicated that includes a clubhouse with fashionable facilities and seven,500 canopy-sheltered seats. New drainage methods are being put in for the observe’s 4 racing surfaces, one in all which can characteristic a brand new artificial floor. Concrete partitions will probably be coated with resilient surfaces to stop horse accidents. 

Though the scheduled fall 2026 completion of Belmont Park’s reconstruction program falls after the scheduled operating of that 12 months’s Belmont Stakes, the New York Racing Affiliation is eyeing the opportunity of bringing the race again from its momentary residence in Saratoga Springs ought to circumstances allow.

In the meantime, the house owners of Churchill Downs in Louisville, Ky., just lately put the brakes on a $900-million plan to renovate three main areas on the residence of the Kentucky Derby, citing building value uncertainties associated to tariff and commerce disputes. In line with an announcement, Churchill Downs will reassess the financial panorama “within the coming months” to guage any adjustments to the multi-year initiatives’ timing and sequencing. 

Two initiatives totaling roughly $30 million—renovations to fifteen suites and an unique membership space—are underway and scheduled to be full in April 2026.