Academy of Holy Angels

Sambatek developed plans for an enhanced training facility for the Academy of Holy Angels in Richfield.

Sports fields are seeing a lot of intense field use and demand for year-round facilities. To provide a better solution, Sambatek replaced a large grass field with a turf field that includes a seasonal sports dome for use in the winter months. The multi-use turf field will be used for baseball, football, lacrosse, and softball. When the dome comes down in the spring, the concrete dome footing is covered with a seasonal turf patch strip, and the whole field is available for practice over the busy summer months.

Challenges with the project included timing with the school calendar, shallow topsoil depth, a tight site for all the amenities desired, and meeting grades with minimal retaining walls.

Turf suppliers require a compacted base and subgrade to minimize field settling. The existing grass field had a topsoil depth of about four feet. We removed 18 inches of topsoil, and then a sand and rock base were put in with drain tile every 20 feet. We were able to grade the site with minimal retaining walls by contouring the site with existing grades.

The turf field is a great example of collaboration between our landscape architecture, civil engineering, and surveying services, all in-house at Sambatek. This helped meet the project timeline of having the new field completed before the start of the new school year.