http://www.bmets.com/multimedia/april/moving.jpg This is from the Binghamton Mets website. http://www.bmets.com/fanzone/folders.asp?folderName=april That grass looks like the real stuff.
You haven't been paying the water bills if you think a Zamboni is more expensive than watering grass. Aloha Stadium in Honolulu has AstroTurf, supposedly cost $2.7 million to put in, and $200,000 a year in maintenance costs. They estimate grass would cost $3 million to put in and $300,000 a year in maintenance. That's the soccer fan in you talking. Not all of the taxpayers in question are soccer fans. Rochester obviously has a bunch of them, but the legislators who vote for such things obviously don't consider us a powerful voting bloc. You're bummed, I can understand that.
There's the answer I was looking for. As a soccer fan, not the one I wanted to hear, but... If they settle for artificial turf, may it be the best artificial surface on the market. AstroTurf = shortened careers.
Actually, there's not a lot of empirical evidence on that, either. Certainly it made playing the game itself a lot more uncomfortable, and players shouldn't have to play a game in a manner that makes it drudgery, because that's no good for anybody. But the studies I've seen haven't shown the true, verifiable impact on player wellness or longevity that everybody just assumes AstroTurf has. I'm not a fan of turf, don't get me wrong - I wouldn't want to play anything on that crap. The new grasstrotuf-type surfaces are only marginally better. I'm just pointing out one possible rationale from their perspective.
Apparently it is a hybred mix of synthetic and natural. This was my orignal post on it. https://www.bigsoccer.com/forum/showpost.php?p=1687942&postcount=117
For those who enjoy reading: www.artificialturf.org/display.cfm?newsID=208 www.physsportsmed.com/issues/1999/10_01_99/news.htm www.footcaremd.com/af_a_injurylevels.html At least the better modern turfs compare favorably against the original faux surfaces of the 60s & 70s at the Vet or Riverfront or Astrodome. They were like those rugs in storefront display windows atop concrete. What's expressed in the above articles... combining quality modern artificial turf with the proper footware... puts up a good argument against us hardliners.
Aloha Staduim replaced its AstroTurf with FieldTurf at the request of the NFL (to help keep the Pro Bowl here). I'm not sure grass would have been a viable option for the stadium, since the stands can be moved for a football or baseball configuration. http://www.alohafame.org/seating.htm
Found some more information. The BMets DO in fact have a synthetic system. It was installed by ClarkComapnies which operates out of Delhi, NY. Their system is called GrassMaster. I don't remember if any of the news articles on the Rhinos situation mentioned this type of synthetic or not. However, here's the link to their site and system. http://www.clarkcompanies.com/defaultsports.htm Some highlights. Seems pretty neat. Interestingly when searching for their company name, I came across a link off of the US Soccer Foundation. Apparently they've done soccer work before including "the Pontiac Silverdome for 1994 World Cup Soccer; Meadowland's Giant Stadium for MetroStars Soccer and pre-season NY." I originally found their name through this link here which is some kind of medical report on the effects of turf on injuries.
Here's a picture from their site. I know none of this really relates directly to Rochester but if I was a rhinos supporter I'd be trying to push the front office hard for this kind of system. I'll try to do a little more research and see where their competitors have used this kind of system in Europe, I believe people have claimed that Ajax does? Also from their site: Binghamton Mets Stadium is a multi-use facility playing host to the Binghamton Mets, the Triple City Jets (semi-pro football), High School Football, Soccer & Baseball. I'll see if I can't find an old article with any information on costs.
I stand corrected. I was looking at an old article. But the cost differences were the key point, and they apparently did consider grass before apparently rejecting it. They still play baseball at Aloha? They haven't had a Triple A team for years.
The only baseball played at Aloha Stadium these days is a few small-college (Hawaii Pacific University) games and the state baseball championship. Very sad.
I haven't had any luck in finding articles on the cost of what the Binghamton Stadium turf project was but here's a list of soccer feilds that they've done. Doesn't appear that any of them were made out of the hybred. I dunno. From another site:
I really need to get a life... The Pitsburg Steelers have announced that they will be insalling the type of hybred system mentioned above. According to this article"The Steelers will pay $700,000 for the turf and installation, which will be completed later this spring. They're using a different company and according the their site... In regards to maintenance: According to them in regards to usage:
Re: I really need to get a life... Wow. I would be interested in seeing what a field like that is like and what it plays like. Too bad we just can't make SuperGrass, actual grass that doesn't wear out as easily. And then figure out a way to grow it indoors.
Re: I really need to get a life... Hey if it's good enough for Liverpool and Real Madrid... That $700k for Heinz seems like a bit of a low estimate for the total cost. Seems to me that this kind of synthetic would be comprable in terms of instalation of any other kind of synthetic. The maintenance costs would probably be akin to maintaining a grass feild, after all it 'is' grass but maybe the durability of it offsets some of that cost. Heh, I just spent way too much time researching that stuff. Hopefully some Rochester fans can put it to good use.
Well, maybe some of it is the soccer fan. But DuRoss is taking his free soccer stadium, and not quite delivering what he promised. It's a soccer stadium with one significant drawback to soccer fans--one that wouldn't be necessary if DuRoss wasn't so eager to make gobs of money off it. I'd say he's falling a little bit short of what he's supposed to do with that money. Of course there are much worse things going on with taxpayer money all around the country. So no, the civic watchdog in me is not all that worried about those taxpayers. But I just wish he'd just build his damn stadium with real grass, and enjoy being profitable in it.
Is it possible that he's not just going cheaper and aesthetically less pleasing simply to up his own margin? Is it possible he can't be profitable in it just by snapping his fingers? Is it possible that, considering how the project has already been scaled back from like $50 million to $22 million, and the Rhinos are deferring as many of their construction bills as possible until they can realize some revenue from the thing, that there was really no other way for it to get done? This is not a $70 million project in Bridgeview with AEG partially behind it, the difference in cost may, in fact, be significant enough to make the difference between getting the deal done and not getting it done. I mean, I don't know. None of us have seen anything but rough numbers, and we don't know if they agonized over it, or just said "Screw it, my profits mean more to me than the enjoyment of the people I'm going to try to sell tickets to." But I'm skeptical over the latter prospect. Maybe that's just me. But Frank DuRoss seems to me, in the few dealings I've had with him and things I've seen, to be a guy who cares about soccer, about this process, and wants to do it as right as he can within the constraints he's up against. Maybe I'm totally wrong. I don't know. But I'd give him the benefit of the doubt before I'd paint him as a robber baron selling out the people he's ostensibly going to be hitting up to pay the freight, whether it's in the A-League or in MLS if that ever comes to pass.
No, he can't simply snap his fingers and be profitable, but he should be able to be profitable by running his stadium well, finding a nice balance of events to hold without tearing up his grass. I too feel that DuRoss is a soccer guy, and I love what he's done for soccer in Rochester. I don't think my guarded disappointment is coming through over the internet. Maybe he hears "FIFA-Approved" and "plays just like grass" and doesn't realize what he's getting into. Maybe the state should have given the money to someone with deep enough pockets to run a stadium(I realize there wouldn't be anyone else). Remember, Lamar Hunt loves soccer as much as you or I, that doesn't mean that Southlake wasn't a mistake.
Fair enough. Though there are those who will say it was more Wagner's doing than Hunt's. And the difference between the number of events you can have on a grass field, no matter how well you try and take care of it, and the number of events you can have on a FieldTurf field, is significant. And maybe you hear "artificial surface" and don't realize that there can be some benefits. I'm on record in favor of grass. But it's not my dime. I wish we could generate enough revenue from soccer in this country that we all had nothing but soccer fields and stadiums that we didn't have to share with anybody, or that we could maintain beautifully, like many NFL and MLB stadiums. Like I said, if those Purdue guys or whoever it was who came up with the tray system could get cracking on getting us SuperGrass that was real and never broke, then we'd have something.
The problem being is that PTP hasn't been sold as a soccer stadium to the taxpayers and politicians in the area. It's been sold as a multi-purpose stadium that the Rhinos will ALSO use as a home.
Funny cause all the articles I've seen online refer to the stadium as a SSS that "other" sports and events will use.
What's the latest on the stadium; real grass or artificial, how many people will the final product hold when it's finished being built the first time, not in the future of if it decides to expand but right now how big are they planning on making it, what amenities is it going to have, is it really going to be a major league stadium or a minor league stadium. I hope the rhinos realize that if they put in an artificial surface and hope to get an mls team it will be a waste of time b/c MLS isnt going to expand anywhere that there is artificial turf.
That's odd, I thought MLS was not going to expand to cities that couldn't break the 7K mark in attendance at an MLS exhibition. MMMM?