Residents, coaches, and athletes visited Masich Place stadium for a city-held open house Wednesday night to hear about the upcoming renovation project and voice their opinions.
The city is moving the track and field area to wear the current soccer pitch is and replacing it with a high-quality, synthetic turf. The new stadium will meet Canadian Football League and FIFA standards, and be the home of some UNBC Timberwolves teams. The field will be surrounded by a dual-coloured, synthetic running track with nearby permanent throwing and jumping facilities, all of which are set to IAAF (International Association of Athletics Federations) standards. The perimeter will have new landscaping, fencing, irrigation, and pathways.
Ron Davis was a long time local track and field coach and remembers being at the stadium in 1990 after it was constructed.
“Tom Masich and myself guarded it the first three Halloweens. We were scared stiff the place was going to be lit on fire by all the hooligans in the city. Of course, all we learned was that it’s damn cold here at 11 o’clock on Halloween night.”
Davis is excited for what these renovations mean for local and northern athletes.
“I really think it’s a step up. Even though it’s not quite track and field specific, it’s more multi-use. I’m looking forward to watching some soccer games here with UNBC and other sports as well.”
Davis shared that he’s concerned about parking and speculated a traffic light may be installed on Massey Drive in a few years.
Stadium namesake Tom Masich was less excited about the major project, strongly voicing his displease on how track and field meets will be conducted. The new layout separates throwing events like shot put from the track and high jump competition.
“Say they’ve got 15 schools from northern British Columbia and the coach is now responsible to cover three fields instead of one field, the poor coach will be a marathon runner by the time the meet’s over,” he says, “everything should be within the same theatre as it is now.”
Spreading out the events will also make it more difficult for spectators to watch. Masich predicts javelins and discuses will land up to 300 feet away from the grandstand.
“It’s pretty but it’s quite dysfunctional.”
Focusing more on team sports than track and field competitions is UNBC Athletics Director Loralyn Murdoch. She’s excited for what this means to the Timberwolves and is hoping all the school’s home games will be played on the new turf. A home stadium is something she feels is very important for student-athletes.
“We’ve been playing at the mercy of the senior man for the past however many years and their grass field and they’ve been very accommodating but the time has come where we need to transition on to turf so we can play longer through the season and start hosting playoffs and hopefully applying for national championships.”
Just like Masich and Davis, Murdoch has concerns about a new facility. Her’s are mostly around practice and game day operations.
“If we were able to play our league games here, how is that going to unfold? Do we have the power we need? Do we have access to Wi-Fi? Do the lights work? Will it be enclosed? Can we have a gate? Those sorts of things that will have to kind of be worked out as we go along,” she says, “The first phase is going to be awesome and I just really hope that as a community we can get together and maybe think long term and do some of the next steps sooner rather than later.”
She adds some of these “next steps” include updating the grandstand to have better change rooms. Mayor Lyn Hall voiced a similar concern at Monday night’s council meeting, similarly starting the current ones are small and outdated. This phase doesn’t include serious renovations to the grandstand but does mention painting its exterior.
The $4.375 million renovation project begins Friday morning. Masich Place will out of commission this summer and upgrades should be finished in the Fall. Many athletic meets, clubs, and practises have been relocated to Ecole Lac Des Bois at 4131 Rainbow Drive.
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