Sports complex construction under budget

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This article was published 22/08/2023 (1004 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Construction on the City of Brandon’s new outdoor sports complex is on time and $400,000 under budget, according to a presentation given at Monday’s city council meeting.

“We plan to be playing on it in spring 2025,” said Bryce Wilson, Brandon’s director of parks operations.

Phase one of construction had its official ground breaking back in May and since then underground infrastructure, land grading, a stormwater retention pond and construction of new dikes have been completed city staff reported Monday.

Brandon City Council first approved the construction of the complex, located at the corner of First Street North and Veterans Way, during budget deliberations in 2021. The project has received funding from both the provincial and federal levels of government.

The current soccer fields are closer to the Assiniboine River and have been covered in water during major events like the flood of 2011.

During construction, planned dikes had to be moved further south than originally expected, which led to savings as crews were able to access materials already in that location according to city engineer Stefanie Lynch.

The dikes built at the complex are being built strong enough to withstand a one-in-300-year flood event.

Lynch said drones are being used by crews to get frequent aerial overviews of the construction site since it is so large.

To finish setting up the land for the sporting features earmarked for it, infrastructure to access the site as well as interior roadways and parking lots still need to be built. City staff said this means phase one is roughly 60 per cent complete.

This fall and winter, the city will undertake preparations for the creation of the fields and buildings of the complex.

Next month, the city plans on issuing a tender to find a company to manage construction for phase two. Then, in January 2024, a tender for finishing the fields, landscaping the site and installing an irrigation system will be issued.

The most expensive part of phase two, according to the presentation, will be adding drains.

Before the pre-election communication blackout went into effect for the provincial government, a $2.5 million grant for the project was announced from the Arts, Culture, Sport & Community Fund.

Those funds, Lynch said, would allow for the FIFA-sized soccer field’s grass to be upgraded to artificial turf at a cost of around $1.05 million. FIFA is the governing body for international soccer and distributes standards for the design of fields.

The rest of those funds will be used to install lighting at the FIFA field and complete phase three projects to finish both field and non-field aspects of the complex, further upgrade the irrigation system and establish a small construction contingency.

The installation of lights will allow for the large soccer pitch to be used for more of the year, Lynch said.

So far, approximately $16.6 million worth of funding has been committed to the project: around $3.9 million from the federal government, approximately $4.2 million from the provincial government, $6 million from the City of Brandon and that $2.5 million provincial grant from earlier this year.

Heading into phase two, Lynch said the city is re-engaging with stakeholders expected to use the complex like Westman Regional Soccer Association, Brandon University, Assiniboine Community College and the Brandon Youth Soccer Association to make sure their priorities are still aligned with Brandon’s.

As part of the funding through the Investing in Canada Infrastructure Project the city has committed to building eight smaller 11 vs. 11 soccer fields, one dedicated 9 vs. 9 field, a clubhouse with changerooms and 3.6 kilometres of pathways.

Earlier this year, Brandon made a couple of attempts to finds sponsors for the field. At this point, Wilson said negotiations are in the final stages for the naming rights for the whole complex, the FIFA-sized pitch and the multi-purpose pitches.

“They’re just dotting ‘i’s and crossing ‘t’s on the paperwork,” Wilson said.

Once those sponsors are announced, Wilson expressed hope that more local businesses would come forward for other sponsorship opportunities.

The 10-year capital plan for the complex, Wilson said, include the addition of tennis and pickleball courts. He told council to stay tuned on that front to next year’s budget deliberations.

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