Development of new soccer fields underway

Ground has finally been broken on the long-awaited soccer fields, slated to go in at the north-end of town.

Four full-sized, irrigated pitches are being developed on land which was once the sewage lagoon for 100 Mile House.

This year, work will concentrate on completing one field and preparing another as far as time and money will allow.

Phil Strain, Director of Engineering and Community Services for the District of 100 Mile House, is the project manager, with the fields a joint initiative by the District and the 100 Mile House and District Soccer Association. He said one field will definitely reach completion by this October, with the work being done by contractor Marshall Landscaping from Kamloops.

According to Strain, the piece of land was a natural for the fields. After becoming decommissioned as a sewage lagoon in the early 1990s, a layer of fill was installed and graded, leaving a level and expansive surface.

Recently, earth-moving machinery stripped the sod off an area that will see two of the fields and a bank is currently being removed from one corner.

Strain said the next step will be to lay approximately 2500 m of perforated drainage pipe, then follow with a 200 mm layer of sand and a 200 mm layer of a peat and sand mixture which will be the growing medium.

An irrigation system will also be installed approximately 30 cm below the surface as part of the process.

“It will be seeded this fall and be ready for play next season,” said Strain.

That means the season’s end, in the fall of 2009, after the grass had has time to mature.

Funding for the field project came from several sources, with $269,000 from the Northern Development Initiative Trust, which is an economic development funding corporation for central and northern British Columbia. Another $75,000 came from the District of 100 Mile and the Cariboo Regional District contributed $25,000. The Soccer Association added $100,000 from a BC Lottery Corporation grant and $50,000 from their own bank account grant for a total of $519,000.

Four fields and a clubhouse are expected to be completed, at the earliest, by the fall of 2010.