Thunder Bay council votes to move forward with more studies of proposed turf sports facility site

The City of Thunder Bay is moving ahead with the evaluation of a north-side site for a proposed indoor turf sports facility.

At Monday's meeting, council voted to continue to investigate whether the new location, south of the Canada Games Complex and west of the Thunder Bay Community Auditorium, would be suitable for the facility.

The city had previously been considering Chapples Park as the location for the facility, which would include a turf field that could be used for various sports, including soccer, year-round.

That version of the project stalled last year after the federal government denied a funding request, and the previous city council voted to hold off on moving the project forward until after the 2022 municipal election.

The new site was pitched by Soccer Northwest Ontario (SNO) in the fall. If the project goes ahead, it would see a hangar-type building constructed there, on a spot currently occupied by a baseball field.

A report presented to council on Monday stated the phase one environmental assessment (ESA) of the site has been completed.

The ESA found it's "likely that fill of unknown quality was imported to the site during the construction of the softball diamond, paved parking areas, and the adjacent buildings. These findings do not give Administration any immediate concerns that would result in a recommendation to abandon the site as a possible location for a proposed indoor turf facility."

Up next is are geological studies of the site, which city general manager of community services Kelly Robertson said will allow the city "to get a sense of the soil and if there's any additional environmental concerns or requirements that we would have to follow through on."

"If there were any concerns, we would come back to council and alert them of that," she said. "If not, that information will help inform such things as the type of foundation that would be required to support the proposed."

The geological study is expected to take about four weeks, with a report going back to council at the end of May.

Monday's report also refines the proposed cost of the facility: the report states if the city were to build it as proposed by SNO, it would cost about $24 million.

However, meeting the city's facility design guidelines, and building to net-zero standards, would increase the price to about $30 million and $33 million, respectively.

The Chapples Park version of the facility has been priced at about $46 million.

Monday's report also notes that the facility would displace a baseball diamond that "heavily used" by three softball leagues. The diamond is well-used because it's larger than many others in the city.

"The large field size allows for different teams to demonstrate their strengths rather than just turning every game into a home run derby," the report states.

The report states the city's parks department has no objection to the removal of that diamond, if it was reconstructed north-west of the site, replacing two underutilized, smaller fields.

That, however, would cost $350,000 to $400,000, and council instead directed parks to see if there are alternatives to reconstructing the larger diamond, Robertson said.

In any case, the project is still in its very early stages, she said.

"What we're doing is exploring an alternate site, and an alternate type of building construction, compared to the original facility that council had supported at Chapples Park originally," Robertson said. "It's too early to talk about construction. We expect to be able to report back at the end of May on the conclusion of our work, barring any major concerns."

"We will report back to council on the implications for the SNO option, and compare that to the Chapples Park facility and site."

Unanswered questions

SNO president Michael Veneziale said the organization still has some unanswered questions coming out of Monday's council meeting, including the reason for the higher costs included in the report.

The initial SNO proposal brought forward last fall included a price tag of about $20 million, including a $1 million contingency," Veneziale said.

"I'm interested to hear back from them more of the details as to why they think it's that expensive," he said. "When we hired somebody, we have it line item by line item exactly how much everything is going to cost."

"It would be interesting to see why theirs is so much higher."