Lack of fields letting sports teams down
A LACK of playing fields in the Queenstown Lakes area is putting a brake on the growth of sporting codes with some teams in Wānaka already unable to either play or train.
A report about future sports field use was presented at a Queenstown Lakes District Council workshop yesterday. The report, produced by consultants RSL, said increasing pressures are being put on sports fields throughout the district as people continue to want to play sport.
In 30 years time the district population is expected to double, reaching 100,588 by 2053. The population is set to increase faster in Wānaka which is already coming under pressure with a lack of sports fields. There are 13 sports parks in the Wakatipu area and five sports parks in Wānaka, although school grounds are also used.
The district had 66 rugby teams, 106 football teams and 131 cricket teams, although more than half of those played sixaside social cricket competitions.
The report said in a calculation of use for sports fields in the Wakatipu area there were seven spare hours of field use a week.
That was likely to disappear over the next few years and in 10 years there would be five hours where a team could not train or play and this would rise to 24 hours every week in 2053. In Wānaka there are not enough fields to go around already and it was only going to get worse.
There were 43 hours a week where a team could not use a field to play or practise last year. This was expected to go up to 80 hours a week in 2033 and be at 142 hours a week in 2053.
The report said the council should look at optimising field use with a districtwide approach and improve the surface of many grounds which would allow for more games and practices.
The report said sporting hubs should also be at the centre of development in the future.
The report set out suggestions by which fields could be improved throughout the district.
A Ballantyne Park sports hub could be developed in Wānaka with two new sandbased fields with floodlights, a sporting hub and a grass cricket wicket. In Queenstown, it was suggested Ladies Mile should have two new sandbased sports fields along with lights and a clubrooms.
Building a sandbased turf at a greenfield development such as Ladies Mile would cost $2 million for two fields and $250,000 for lighting.
Otago Country Cricket Association said it was a struggle to fit in all junior games and no club had its own clubrooms.
Football South said there were not enough grounds to host all football games, it also urged caution about sandbased fields saying sand froze quicker than soil and grass fell apart quicker with sand than soil.
Otago Rugby Football Union said the unavailability of grounds after the club season limited representative games. Council sport and recreation manager Simon Battrick said, when contacted after the meeting, the council wanted people to be out playing sport but it was fiscally constrained.
There was no magic solution and money had to be pushed to other areas.
The council was set to approve the longterm plan tomorrow and was looking to bring spending forward on development at Ballantyne Park and Ladies Mile but that was still at least five years away. There was no big green space available to build fields in Queenstown but Ballantyne Park in Wanaka had 20ha of land and could be used in the future.