WASHINGTON, D.C. -- On a clear day near the top of Nationals Park, on the banks of the Anacostia River, one may not be able to see forever, but one can certainly see the glistening, white dome of the U.S. Capitol Building only a few miles away to the north.

That will certainly be the signature television shot repeatedly broadcast world-wide after the ballpark opens next season, and for years to come.

"Oh, it's going to be great," said Nats manager Manny Acta, about moving out of antiquated RFK Stadium into the new digs. "You've got to put nostalgia and tradition aside if you want to be into one of those places like most of the teams in the league now. I toured the facility a couple of days ago and I was just blown away, very impressed.

"The players like that, and it's going to have a dual effect for us. It's also going to help us land free agents in the future. Who wouldn't want to come to a state-of-the-art facility like that in the capital of the United States?"

And so, for all naysayers who doubted in 2005 that the Nationals would move into their new 41,000-seat ballpark by 2008, it's time to put all those notions to rest.

Major League Baseball left the old stadium due east of the Capitol for the second time on Sunday. And barring an act of violent nature, this time it should be for good. The new yard is projected to be finished on time, if not a bit ahead of schedule for its grand opening on or around next April 1.

"Let's hope. Yeah, we certainly think so," said Nats president Stan Kasten the other day. "Anything's possible, you know, but we're absolutely planning on Opening Day '08 in the new ballpark. It'll be done by then."

The only question now is whether the facility will be available for an exhibition-game walk-thru before the season opener, which could be as early as March 31 -- ESPN's traditional Sunday night extravaganza.

"We're still scheduling, but we're going to try to have one," Kasten said about a possible dress rehearsal. "We definitely need it as a run through. If we can do it, we're going to definitely try. Every ballpark is built the same way and here's why: it costs money to speed up. There's no need to get it done one day ahead of time. So by design, it's not done until it has to be done. It won't be done until Opening Day. That's my prediction."

After years of haggling out a contractual deal between officials of the District and MLB, who then owned a moribund Montreal franchise, those are sweet words indeed.

After a two-year relocation process, the Expos were tentatively moved to Washington near the end of the 2004 season. Before that year was out, a battle royal between the District City Council and MLB ensued, and for one week that December the franchise was placed back in limbo. MLB ultimately compromised on deal points and critical anti-ballpark Council votes shifted. And in the end, the ballpark deal was struck with the District placing a $611 million cap on its own funds earmarked toward the project.

The Nationals played their first game at RFK on April 14, 2005, nearly 34 years after the expansion Senators fled to Texas at the end of the 1971 season. Groundbreaking for the new ballpark occurred on May 4, 2006. The steel structure was completed on Oct. 5, 2006, one day earlier than the contract stipulated. This past July 11, a day after the American League defeated their National League counterparts in the All-Star Game in San Francisco, the ballpark was "topped out," meaning that the structure had gone as high as it was architecturally planned to go.

"That was a great day," said Steve Barbehenn, the senior project manager on the construction site, during a tour of the facility on Friday. "I've been on many big projects, but this is my first stadium. And as a huge baseball fan, it's a lot of fun to see this one grow."

Right now, no one needs to envision a finished product. It's pretty much there for all to see with its light gray steel and glass shell, its dark blue seats lining most of the multiple cement decks. The "O" in the big red "Nationals" logo above the scoreboard in right-center was set in place on Friday, completing the team nickname. The oval home clubhouse will be fully outfitted by the end of year. The drainage system beneath the field is being laid in layers. On top of that will go the green turf on which, beginning next spring, baseball will be played.

"We're looking at laying down the sod by the end of October," said Greg O'Dell, the chief executive of the D.C. Sports & Entertainment Commission, which is overseeing the project for the District.

"The structure is about 90-to-95-percent finished," Barbehenn added. "Internally, we still have a lot of work to do. What you're looking at now is about 75 percent of the completed project."

That's 25 percent left to do with about six months to go. On time and on budget, said Matthew Cutts, the Commission's chairman, and that without hyped up amenities, much double-shifting of construction workers or seven-day weeks at this point.

"There are no marble and gold faucets," he said with a chuckle. "Not in this project."

Any significant additions are being funded by the Nationals, a franchise which was purchased by the Lerner family from MLB for $450 million last year. Though Kasten said that could cost his owners "10s of millions of extra dollars," to add bathrooms to the suites, bigger and better restaurants and a High Definition feature to the scoreboard, in reality the Commission said their orders so far reflect a figure well below that.

"We have purchase orders for about $8.5 million worth of additions from them," O'Dell said. "And that includes $2.5 million for the scoreboard."

As in most of these projects, disputes may arise regarding who has to pay for what, but Kasten said the parameters are definitive. Already, construction items are in contention and the matter has been brought to arbitration stipulated in the agreement.

"The program is set and they're only going to pay for X things," Kasten said. "I don't know what happens if the costs go over that. But they have to deliver a certain program, period. Again, that's not my part of the equation, it's theirs. But the things extra over the program that we want, obviously we're going to have to do, the improvements we have to make."

Part of the program is, of course, parking, and by contract the District has to provide 1,225 on-location spots, while the Nationals are responsible for identifying another 5,000 in the area. The former is done. Two parking garages for the luxury suite owners are located outside the bleachers on the left- and right-field sides. Another 100 have also been added to the mix, Barbehenn said.

That means there will be no on-site parking for general ticket buyers, who like patrons at old-school facilities in Chicago (Wrigley Field), Boston (Fenway Park) and New York (Yankee Stadium) and throwbacks in San Francisco (AT&T Park) must search the neighborhood for adequate parking or use public transportation. To that end, an expansion to the existing Metro station is being finished about a quarter mile north of the ballpark. Also, a plan is being considered to shuttle fans who want to use the parking lots that surround RFK, about three miles away.

"Yeah, [parking] was an issue and it's going to remain an issue as we continue to resolve it, but I'm confident we'll get it resolved," Kasten said. "Fortunately, we have the advantage of a brand-new Metro station that will be on our doorstep. That's what I hope most people learn to use because it really, really is convenient."

General ticket buyers will also find that many of the premium seats behind home plate and up the baselines in the infield are reserved for the 1,800 club seat and 71 suite holders. The 300 Presidential Seats behind home plate are the top rung ticket, costing $300 each and must be purchased on a full-season ticket basis. The great mass of tickets available to the public on various season ticket plans or on a game-by-game basis are either up the lines beyond first and third bases or in the outfield, where the Nationals have promised low-cost tickets at $5 and $10 for every game.

Kasten noted that design of the ballpark was hammered out between the District and MLB long before the Lerners were awarded the club, closing the team's sale just after the July 2006 All-Star break, some three months beyond ground breaking.

"It's too bad that we came into the picture so late because we might have designed some things differently," Kasten said. "But the design was done when we got here, so there wasn't much structurally we could change."

No matter. It's not as if there was a huge clamor for premium seats even at RFK. After 22,000 season tickets were sold in the first blush of baseball's return to the capital three years ago, that number has dropped to about 15,000 this season, Kasten said. The Nationals finished 25th among the 30 Major League teams in attendance this season, topping the 1.9 million mark and averaging less than 24,000 people a game.

That ought to change in the new environment, and as the Nationals improve on the field. Of baseball's top-10 draws this season, seven teams play in new or relatively refurbished ballparks, plus the two New York teams are moving into their new facilities in 2009.

It's no stretch of the imagination, then, standing near the topping-off point of Nationals Park, to foresee a world of possibilities and a long prosperous future for baseball in the District, replicating the staying power of the monuments and the Capitol rotunda within view.