Legion Field
Legion Field is a large stadium at 400 Graymont Avenue in the Graymont neighborhood. It is primarily designed to be used as a football venue, but is also used for other large outdoor events. The stadium is named in honor of the American Legion, a U.S. organization of military veterans. It was built in 1926 for a cost of $439,000. After several expansion, it's peak capacity was 83,810 for a soccer match during the 1996 Olympics. The recent removal of the upper deck has reduced the capacity to 71,594.
Until the 1990s the University of Alabama played the majority of their home football games at Legion Field, a practice that has now ended. Auburn University has used the stadium similarly for a while, but not as extensively. It currently serves as the home field for the UAB Blazers, who compete in Conference USA.
Legion Field was best-known for hosting the annual Iron Bowl between Alabama and Auburn every year from 1948 to 1998. In 1989 Auburn moved their "home" games in the series to their own stadium. Alabama followed suit in 2001.
Legion Field also hosted three post-season bowl games, the Dixie Bowl (1947-1948), the Hall of Fame Classic (1977-1985) and the All-American Bowl (1986-1990). In addition, it was the site of the first two SEC football championship games. It still hosts the title game for the Southwestern Athletic Conference.
The venue also served as home field for the Birmingham Americans (Vulcans) of the World Football League (1974-1975), the Birmingham Stallions of the United States Football League (1983-1985), and the Birmingham Fire of the World League of American Football (now NFL Europe) in 1991-92. Afterward in 1995, it was the home field of the Birmingham Barracudas for their single season of play as part of the short-lived expansion of the Canadian Football League into the U.S. In 2001 it was the home field for the single season of the Birmingham Thunderbolts of the XFL. On August 19, 2004, the University of Alabama announced that they would not be playing any further home games at Legion Field, leaving UAB as the sole regular season tenant. The city uses the stadium for occasional high school football matchups and for the annual "Super 6" AHSAA state high school football championships.
Recently, Legion Field, with a new high-tech grass surface, has been used successfully as a site for major soccer events, including matchups in the 1996 Olympics, exhibition games by the U.S. men's and women's national soccer teams, and in 2005 it hosted a World Cup qualifier between the U.S. and Guatemala.
In 2006, to accomodate high school football games, the Birmingam Park and Recreation Board, reconverted the grass surface back to artificial turf. As a result, the future of world class soccer at Legion Field is doubtful.
In 2004 a structural evaluation determined that the 9,000 seat upper deck, installed in 1961, would need major remediation to meet modern building codes. Because the capacity of the stadium was well beyond the needs of any of its current tenants, the process of dismantling and removing the upper deck was begun in June 2005, and completed two months later.