More than half of the 2.6 million fans expected to attend games at Great American Ball Park in 2003 will come from outside Greater Cincinnati, according to a University of Cincinnati study to be released today.

Those visitors will spend $75 million downtown during the new riverfront ballpark's inaugural season - direct spending that will in turn create almost 2,000 jobs and $49 million in earnings for those workers.

UC's Economics Center for Education and Research report also predicts a total economic jolt of $253 million from local and visiting fans, the Reds organization and its players, and visiting teams and media. That spending will help create and/or support 3,919 jobs.

The jobs and taxes from construction of the stadium accounted for another $676 million in economic activity for Greater Cincinnati's economy, more than double the $280 million that Hamilton County taxpayers contributed through a half-cent sales tax increase.

The report - the first measuring the Reds impact on the local economy since the early 1990s - was commissioned by the Greater Cincinnati Convention and Visitors Bureau and the Greater Cincinnati Chamber of Commerce.

Ken Alltucker