Big changes coming to BC Place

[Bill]

Just read the front page of today's Sun sports section by Ian Walker and there's references to huge changes coming to BC Place, and not just the roof.

Lenarduzzi mentioned that the changes will look amazing in his words. Things along the lines of steeper seating, etc.

I can also tell you that Dupont is developing a special type of paint that can be applied to the new field at BC Place which will glow at light beamed at certain wavelengths.

The football gribirons can then be projected on to teh field for a football game and when switching to a soccer team they just simply beam the lines onto the field for that.

If this technology is successful, it will get around the problem of the Whitecaps having to play on a football field with the gridiron lines on it which looks terrible.

[michaeltfc91]

Will they put real grass?

[Richard]

^ Real grass is very unlikely and huge changes to BC Place included seating adjustments to meet Whitecaps conditions have been part of the plan from the very beginning. What Lennarduzzi was referring to in the Sun article were the beautiful renderings of a re-jigged BC Place that form part of the Whitecaps MLS bid.

[Calgary Boomer]

I've always wondered whether laser projection, or fibre optic artificial grass blades technology would come around soon. That would solve a lot problems, and certainly look better.

[Richard]

The technology referenced is not fibre optics, it is a material that luminesces (gives off light) when radiated with energy at a specific wavelength. Until there is a link to a credible source this remains in the realm of rumour however.

[Johnnie Monster]

It seems a bit dodgy to be relying on overhead lights to define the pitch markings... what if the lights malfunction?

[Bill]

Dupont is a leader in technological innovation. The other problem with luminescent or phosphorescent lines is shadows. Players shadows would block off the light. There would be dim spots all over the place.

And how well would the lines be seen from field level?

I wouldn't be surprised if Dupont has a Patent on this technology so they'll want to keep the details secret until a contract is signed.

[Johnnyranger]

What happens if a bear farts and the gasses mix with the wavelength just right? Will the roof blow off?

[Bill]

Let me work on that

[Kibby]

Please do Bill.. cause that's a serious safety issue worry of mine to.

[Guest Jeffery S.]

I am still amazed that nothing further has been made of a technology I was told about 4 years ago, when I went with my kid and they played on a new fieldturf pitch-in fact it was the opening tournament- in a town outside of Barcelona, whose senior team is like in 7th tier.

Some guy next to me explained that they could lay down the turf with sections of grass all with optical or illuminated fibers inside the blades, connected to a grid, and with a computer turn on and off the colour of those sections but hitting a configuration on a controlling computer to get the lines they wanted. Only the parts representing lines would have to be on the grid, and of course these blades would have to have the same consistency as the rest but be effectively translucent.

It sounded expensive, but very innovative, and of course clearly feasible, it sounded logical. Considering what is paid for these surfaces it seemed like a great idea.

And I have only heard wilder, less logical solutions since. With all the money in football I am perplexed why this technology has not been developed. Not only that, why was it a guy beside me in a kid's tournament in a small town in Catalonia was the only person I have ever heard explain it in a reasonably technical way.

By the way there is a good Lenarduzzi interview on the Caps site, where he calls the rendering of the new stadium "soccer specific" and assures all it is very innovative, though they won't unveil it. He also spoke of a 5 year deal at BC Place before moving on, if deemed necessary to their own stadium.

http://www.whitecapsfc.com/archive/feature_v_10150801.aspx

[Vic]

That is really cool. Where exactly was the stadium?

[piltdownman]

Details on the renovations are online:

Eight new accessible entrances

· Eight ramps will get new flooring, lighting and colour over 35,000 square feet

· 52 washroom blocks totaling 40,000 square feet will be upgraded with new finishes and fixtures

· Provisions added to each washroom group including new stalls, counters and a family washroom

· Disabled seating integrated throughout the stadium

· 40 concessions will get new fronts including accessible counters, new signage, monitors and fixtures

· Six new and six existing grill concessions will be upgraded to gas, complete with new appliances

· 80,000 square feet of concourses on Level 2 and Level 4 will be upgraded with new lighting, wall

treatments and entry points to ramps and seating

· 35 renovated suites and seven new suites, upgraded seating areas including two new lounges, and a

redesigned

Edgewater Lounge will be built

· All internal and external signage will be replaced by new contemporary signage and graphics

http://www.bcplacestadium.com/vision2011.shtml

[piltdownman]

Looks like most of the money is being spent on luxury suits and a posh lounges

[Joe MacCarthy]

Field of Screens

Monte Burke 11.27.06

In a few years NFL gridirons will become their own Jumbotrons. "Turf TV" might put the plasma in the den to shame.

Imagine this: you pull in your driveway after a long day at the office, step out of your car, and suddenly your lawn, yes, your lawn, lights up with a "Welcome Home, Honey!" Or how about this: The military has a runway deep in enemy territory that it wants to keep from getting blown up, so it changes the color of the landing turf to brown to blend in with the surrounding desert. When a plane comes in for a landing, two strips of lights appear. After the plane has landed, with a push of a button the strip reverts to camouflage mode.

Sounds cool, right? This technology will be available soon, making its grand entrance as a National Football League field. Mark Nicholls, the founder and chief executive of Sportexe, the number two maker of artificial turf in the NFL, has patented the process of "tufting" fiber optics with blades of plastic grass. "We will be able to turn the football field into a giant Jumbotron," says Nicholls.

A field can display a huge American flag during the national anthem. At halftime a sponsor such as Budweiser could cover the field with its logo. During the game, that virtual first-down marker you see on your TV could now be on the field itself before the ball is snapped. And because sensors beneath the fibers can sense when any given blade's light is obscured, referees can track the footsteps of a player to determine if he was in-bounds or not. Stadium owners would welcome the technology as well, as it would help them get more use out of the field: A few mouse clicks is all it takes to change the field from a gridiron to a soccer pitch. Compare that to the 2.5-hour, $650 process of cleaning and repainting lines on today's artificial fields.

Sportexe's interactive field is merely the latest salvo in the escalating artificial turf wars. AstroTurf, that pale green, postmodern creation of the 1960s, loathed by players and TV-viewers alike, is gone from NFL stadiums. It's been replaced by what's known as "in-fill" turf systems, which cover a football field with 50 million to 70 million 2.5-inch-tall blades of "grass" made from polyethylene, cushioned by a mixture of rubber pellets and silica that acts as the dirt. The in-fill fields look and feel more like natural grass; one company even supplies a spray that smells like freshly mowed grass.

The new fields claim to be softer and more forgiving than AstroTurf, which was a nylon rug laid over a shock-absorbing pad and concrete. The players like them better, too. But James Bradley, the Pittsburgh Steelers' chief physician, says not enough research has been done on the new fields to validate a safety advantage. "I'd still prefer to see every game played on grass," he says.

The in-fill system was patented in 1981 by a former professional golfer named Frederick Haas to make truer hitting surfaces in tee boxes. Its potential for sports fields was realized early on, but AstroTurf so dominated the artificial turf market that it wasn't until 2002 that the first in-fill field was installed in the NFL, at Seattle's Seahawks Stadium (now called Qwest (nyse: Q - news - people ) Field). All 12 of the 31 NFL stadiums with artificial turf now use in-fill systems. In-fill systems are also found at baseball stadiums and town parks, and were recently approved by the Fédération Internationale de Football Association for World Cup soccer qualifying matches.

FieldTurf in Montreal (revenue: $235 million), run by a former Canadian Football League quarterback, is the market leader with eight stadiums, including Ford (nyse: F - news - people ) Field in Detroit, host of last year's Super Bowl, the first ever played on an in-fill surface. FieldTurf says it has built 1,900 sports fields and 150 fields in town parks. The town of Redding, Calif. recently built four in-fill fields. Sportexe, in Fonthill, Ont. (revenue: $50 million), is the distant number two, with 300 fields, 2 of them for the NFL.

But Sportexe, 40% owned by former Baltimore Ravens owner Art Modell, believes the future of turf is interactive. Here's how its "turf TV" works: A computer sends an image to the field, where it is distributed among 1,750 interconnected square trays, 7.5 feet on a side, that host their own light processing circuitry. Thousands of blades of polyethylene grass, blended with optical fibers, reflect light upward from the trays. It's like a computer monitor that you can walk on. A football field would have 128 million pixels, which works out to 1,280 per square foot. In pixels per square foot it can't hold a candle to your television set; in total pixels it's well ahead.

Unlike your flat screen at home, this display is equipped to withstand the impact of a 380-pound lineman. The blades are conducting light, not electricity, so athletes can't be electrocuted on rainy days, even if they're losing badly.

At $1.5 million, the purchase price of an interactive field will be three times that of an unilluminated in-fill field and eight times that of a natural grass field. But Sportexe's Nicholls points out that the ten-year maintenance bill on grass can approach $1 million, 20 times the cost of maintaining an in-fill field. A stadium owner may be able to pay the mortgage on the interactive grass with ad revenue or host more events if the field lines can be changed so easily and rapidly.

Nicholls says the lit-up fields are still two years away from commercialization. The technology, though, is already being employed, most notably on artificial Christmas trees.

"The technology isn't really that amazing," he says. "It's just that no one's done it on a field yet."

Ontario company uses fibre optics to turn turf into giant displays

Whoa ... that is one BIG flat-screen

[piltdownman]

I would imagine that when they say 1,280 pixels per square foot it is really 8 x 8 '20 pixel patches'. That would be 192 (64 x 3{RGB}) LEDS per square foot, each with 20 fiber stands, which technically be doable. My father did an installation of a computerized disco floor using a similar principle. That used 2500, 10 cm by 10cm back lit tiles.

[Tuscan]

As cool as this would be I hope it would only be a temporary solution, only being needed until full funding and financing for a full grass pitch at a true soccer-specific stadium can be reached. The game is meant to be played on grass, and nothing more.

[Bill]

The Roof work has just been put out to tender!

http://www.bcbid.gov.bc.ca/open.dll/welcome

click on Browse and BC Pavilion Corporation

The B.C. Pavilion Corporation (PavCo) is seeking Proposals from Proponents experienced in

providing construction management and general contracting services for the replacement of

the existing roof and other improvements at B.C. Place Stadium.

Qualified and experienced Proponents are invited to submit Proposals. PavCo will consider

Proposals from Proponents who are able to meet all of the requirements as set out in the

Request for Proposal. Selection will be made on the basis of a combination of financial

resources, bonding capability, staffing, qualifications, and price.