Articles
Pickleball And Tennis
The only thing more prevalent than pickleball these days is this question: “Should we line our tennis courts for pickleball, too, or just have separate pickleball courts?”
Stormwater Management Takes The Field
Many parks, recreation, and athletic facilities serve as community hubs where residents gather to compete, play, socialize, and enjoy the outdoors. These prized community assets can play an even bigger role by incorporating infrastructure to manage stormwater, mitigate flooding, and achieve water-quality goals.
Calculating Demand
Park planning has become increasingly data-driven in recent years. For instance, the Los Angeles County Department of Parks and Recreation (DPR) collects and analyzes a high volume and variety of data to prepare major plans and studies, with key examples including the 2016 Parks Needs Assessment (PNA), Community Parks and Recreation Plans (CPRP) for the most park-poor communities, and the 2022 Parks Needs Assessment Plus (PNA+).
Play Up Social Opportunities
One of the great advantages of sports is they bring people together. Let’s face it—it’s just plain fun to catch up with friends, whether watching kids in Little League or finishing a great game of pickleball or tennis and wanting to unwind and talk.
Alternatives To Traditional Turf
The benefits of turf alternatives have been debated for years. Members of city councils, the parks commission, or perhaps even community members have touted the benefits.
Premier Sports Complexes
So, you have built a premier sports complex. How do you make it pay? By keeping it busy every day.
Catching The Cricket Bug
There’s no end to the number of sports that have been brought to the USA through immigration, such as soccer, field hockey, and rugby. And that’s not even taking into consideration other popular fixtures on the competition calendar like wrestling and track and field.
Triple Play
In Oxford, Ohio, this quote fits well for a field-renovation project that’s been ongoing for nearly half a decade and has finally wrapped up. Divvying up one adult softball field into three youth baseball and softball diamonds is almost as exciting as a triple play in youth baseball.
A Dynamic Differentiator
It’s no secret that northern climates impose challenges to practice and game time for outdoor sports like soccer, football, and baseball. While southern states enjoy the outdoors, their northern neighbors endure drastic conditions, from blizzards and ice to rain, winds, and floods—often cutting several weeks from the season and limiting off-season practices.
Hit It Out Of The Park
On a Saturday morning at Miracle Field in Wichita, Kan., one will find a group of special athletes participating in America’s pastime—baseball. While some use wheelchairs or walkers, others are blind or have intellectual disabilities—all are ready to have a swing of the bat, round the bases, and catch a ball.
Accessible Facilities
More than three decades ago the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) became law. At the time, it was groundbreaking, ushering in an era in which accessible restrooms, wheelchair ramps for public facilities, curb cuts, and other means of accommodation were mandated.
Field Sports Park provides safe, supervised firing-range opportunities
East of one of the busiest freeways in California, bright lights beckon southbound drivers coming from San Jose on Highway 101. Those who have wondered but never stopped to inquire may be surprised to learn they have just passed the only publicly-owned firing range in the Bay Area.
Infill Depth Perfection
After nearly six decades on the market, synthetic-turf fields for recreation and athletic facilities are an integral part of being able to schedule and complete games. While the technology has evolved since the Houston Astros played its first season on synthetic turf in 1966, the application remains resource-intensive to install and replace, along with regular maintenance.
A Bump In Activity
One of the up-and-coming forms of volleyball is played on snow. In fact, the sport is expected to experience a veritable blizzard of growth in years to come.
Fundamentals Of Sports Park Design
The Sports Ranch at Sommers Bend, located in Temecula, Calif., opened to the public in February 2022. The city-owned and –operated, 20-acre, $11.8-million park was a turn-key project constructed by the developers of the Sommers Bend master-planned community (Woodside Homes of Southern California and Wingsweep Corporation), part of a larger development agreement with the city that also included roads, trails, and other public improvements.
Want Big Results?
Wildly popular at the youth level, soccer and lacrosse are big tournament draws. One of the most successful formats—and one seeing tremendous growth—is small-sided play.
Field Of Play
It’s easy to host. It’s affordable to maintain. There are plenty of potential players. And it’s hot and growing and can bring a younger demographic into your park.
Branding Sand
I’ve done hundreds of logos in the past 40 years of working on athletic fields for games, playoffs, special events, and corporate functions. I’ve used both permanent and removable paint, aerosol and liquid, some chalk, and colored calcine clays; however, none of the projects were as simple or as difficult as etching 25-foot-high letters in the sand at Huntington Beach.
Play Your Part
There are approximately 39,000 golfing landscapes globally. Because the sport is played outdoors, we all have a duty to be responsible custodians of the land.
In Memoriam: Norris Legue, Founder of Synthetic Surfaces
Norris Legue, founder of Synthetic Surfaces and “Guru of Glue,” died May 29, 2022 at the age of 85. Norris was a great friend of Parks & Rec Business (PRB) magazine joining us for the first time in the October 2004 issue and showing up each month thereafter for nearly 20 years.