LITTLE ROCK – The state’s only medical school and the city zoo have agreed on a proposal for vacant Ray Winder Field that would allow both of them to expand.

Little Rock Mayor Mark Stodola explained at a news conference Monday that the plan calls for the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences to receive the city’s half of the 7.2-acre ballpark, while the Little Rock Zoo would receive a parking lot immediately to the east. The school and zoo each had submitted proposals for the land.

The deal still requires city approval. The state owns the other half of the land but is expected to follow the city’s lead and sell it to the same buyer.

The Arkansas Travelers minor league baseball team vacated the ballpark in 2007 to move to a new stadium in North Little Rock. The 77-year-old baseball stadium is in the middle of the city and is within War Memorial Park, a complex that includes the zoo, golf course, children’s playground, and health club and swimming pool, as well as the football and baseball stadiums.

The parking lot that the zoo would receive is part of an easement granted to War Memorial Stadium. The stadium commission agreed to release the land in exchange for replacement parking spaces from the medical school.

UAMS Chancellor I. Dodd Wilson and representatives of the zoo and the stadium commission all expressed support for the proposal at Monday’s news conference with Stodola.

“We really didn’t have a dog in this fight,” War Memorial Stadium Commission Chairman Gary Smith said. But he said the panel agreed to get involved because the proposal “made too much sense.”

UAMS, which has more than 10,000 employees, has expanded consistently over the past three decades, and Wilson said there’s no reason to expect the trend to stop.

The zoo has about 300,000 visitors each year and is preparing to open a new penguin exhibit. Stodola and other officials said it can’t compete with other zoos in the region without more land.

A number of official actions have to take place for the plan to be executed.

The Little Rock City Board must approve a resolution that would allow city officials to negotiate a price with UAMS. The value is estimated at $1.1 million after teardown costs for the stadium are figured. The board also would have to sign off on a new lease for War Memorial Stadium, incorporating the easement changes.

Little Rock owns the stadium itself that’s at Ray Winder Field, along with 3.8 acres of the land on which it sits. The state owns 3.35 acres. The boundary line is between first and second base and through right center field.

Smith said the stadium commission has right of first refusal for the Ray Winder land that’s owned by the state, a right the panel will relinquish.

“In a compromise, everyone’s got to give up something,” Smith said.