Yankee Stadiums Wander

I went to my first Yankees game of the '10 season two weekends ago. They lost to the White Sox, but it was a beautiful sunny Sunday afternoon, with a couple of the boys, some overpriced beers and hotdogs, and we luckily even had some shade all game so I didn't become too pink. Getting off the D train, I was startled to see only a tiny section of seats from the old Yankee Stadium left standing behind the blue New York signature construction plywood fence. The whole thing is a huge hole in the ground now.

Last year was my first year in New York, so also my first Yankee game. As a male in New York, you have a couple critical decisions to make, and I was really torn on this one, but I've officially decided on the Yankees.
I didn't make it in time to see a game at the old Yankee Stadium, but I did make a wander over to the Bronx to see it before it came down, and also to see the new Yankee Stadium before the season started.

Old Yankee Stadium:

The original Yankee Stadium aka The House that Babe Built was constructed in 1923 for $2.4 million. Originally is sat 58 000. The Yankees won a record 26 World Series Championships there.
New Yankee Stadium:

 

The 2008-2009 season was the first for the Yankees in this new $1.3 billion stadium, and so far they're 1-for-1; winning the World Series over the Phillies in 6. I think it's a beautiful stadium, they did a really good job making the stadium suite the team, very grand and classy, there isn't a lot of ornamental crap hanging off it, just simple like the pin stripes with no names on the back, and they made it a hitters park to suit the historically strength of the team. This stadium and the Mets' new stadium, Citifield, both did great jobs in this respect, and the differences in the stadiums perfectly mirror the differences in the teams.
Building the new stadium wasn't all fun and games though; a devious Boston fan buried a Red Sox jersey in the concrete slab. It cost $50 000 to dig it out and avoid any potential curse. To add to that, it came out that the company in charge of testing the concrete faked test results at the stadium and a couple other small construction projects around the city like the Freedom Tower World Trade 1.

Looking down 161st at old Yankee Stadium from Joyce Kilmer Park...

... and then at the two standing side by side.

On a different Wander, I took this shot from Harlem, on the opposite side of the Harlem River :

Now fast forward to last weekend. New Yankee Stadium:

The Great Hall:

New York construction site -- seen that a hundred times:

Except that this one used to be Yankee Stadium. Only a small section of the right field bleachers are still standing:

Since the new stadium was built on the Macombs Dam Park, the Yankees had to promise to tear down the old stadium and build a new park for the neighbourhood. They were supposed to have it torn down last year, but I guess it took them a long time to take it apart brick-by-brick and in 1-foot-square chunks of turf so they could sell it all off.

 Looking down from the el, a giant hole in the ground.