Boston United FC

McArdle and partners TigerTurf lead the way with an innovative 3rd Generation Football Pitch utilising a state-of-the-art fully recycled ecocept base design with a Sustainable Urban Drainage System.

Background:

In 2021, McArdle Sport Tec and partners TigerTurf were appointed by Boston United Football Club known to their fans as ‘The Pilgrims’; to install a state-of-the-art 3G football pitch at their new home ‘The Jakemans Community Stadium’.

The artificial sports pitch was partially funded through developers Chestnut Homes, The Premier League, Football Association and Sport England, managed by the Football Foundation.

The new 3G football pitch is part of the Chestnut Homes ‘Quadrant development’ which includes the Jakemans Community Stadium and will be used by the Pilgrims community teams and available to the public.

More than just a surface:

On first appearances, this 3G Artificial Sports Pitch may look exactly like other artificial pitch installations, however with an innovative SUDS (Sustainable Urban drainage System) to attenuate any site wide excess storm water run-off, a cement and lime stabilised formation and the fully recycled ecocept macadam replacement layer underneath the TigerTurf Atomic Pro grass carpet, this truly is a pioneering and fundamental facility.

Measuring 993 cubic meters with the capacity to hold up to one million litres of surface water; the fully maintainable storm water cellular attenuation tank system stores excess water underground during periods of heavy rainfall which is then released slowly into the local watercourse effectively reducing the risk of localised flooding.

The grass is greener ‘underside’:

Boston United’s new 3G pitch is a pioneering eco-friendly installation, shaping the future of the sports facility industry. McArdle Sport Tec are committed to reducing our ecological footprint and delighted that the attenuation tank drainage system is completely eco-friendly. The GeoLight crates are made entirely from recycled post-consumer PVC which are usually destined for landfill.

In additional to ecological attenuation tank crate system, an ecocept layer was installed as a green alternative to an engineered base layer.

The TigerTurf ecocept layer is made from 90% recycled plastics which can include up to 10 redundant artificial sports carpets, diverting up to 100 tonnes of material ending up in landfill offering a closed loop to loop eco solution.

Utilising ecoCept on this project saved up to 190 CO2 emissions which is the equivalent to 112 trees being planted or 22 years’ worth of CO2 emissions from an average sized car! Installing the ecocept layer also reduced the amount of SBR infill required by 40% compared with typical Football Foundation framework installations.

Other associated benefits to using ecocept, meant no aggregate was required to create a traditional stone base layer, in turn saved the use of materials, but also the need for construction machinery and eliminated transportation vehicles for deliveries of stone.

The club also installed TigerUp! trekboards, which are designed for infill retention and to mitigate infill from migrating into the surrounding areas. Trekboards are made from 100% recycled mixed waste plastics which is the equivalent of up to 600,00 plastic carrier bags! Boston United FC saved 4320kgs of CO2 just by installing this economical alternative to traditional timber kickboards.

Once the system does, eventually, come to the end of its life, the ecocept base, artificial grass carpet and trekboards can all be recycled again either back into an ecocept base layer or into more trekboards for their next pitch.