9 things to know about SunTrust Park

Parking, bridges, and tailgating at SunTrust Park

Braves Tailgating
Photograph by Jonathan Daniel/Getty Images

Remember the Woody Allen joke about the two old ladies complaining about their meal? “The food at this place is really terrible,” says one. “Yeah, I know,” says the other, “and such small portions.” That sort of describes the parking situation at Turner Field, which had just 8,600 official parking spaces, plus an unknown number of gypsy lots set on crumbling asphalt.

With 13,000 parking spots, SunTrust Park is bumping up the official capacity by 50 percent over the Ted. Expect to pay between $10 and $21, depending on proximity.

The Braves app allows drivers to buy parking in advance in the zone that matches their direction of travel—the south zone for Midtown and north for Kennesaw, etc. Pre-purchasing is designed to help disperse vehicles and allow for better traffic flow.

For fans parked off-site, three pedestrian bridges costing $29 million in total will be ready for opening day (though landscaping will come later). The largest spans 1,100 feet over I-285 and connects with the Galleria’s convention center, another bridge arcs over I-75 to the northeast, and the third bridge links the park to surface streets.

For tailgaters, the Braves will operate two lots northeast of the ballpark, totaling about 820 spaces, which will have built-in grills, tables, and restrooms designed with pregame brouhaha in mind.

This article originally appeared in our April 2017 issue.