Specifying for sports

by John Gelder
NBS Content Development Manager

Though most fabric and services systems and products can be used in facilities of all types, some are specific to a particular facility. So where does a specifier go for neutral authoritative technical information on systems and products pertaining to sports facilities? John Gelder, NBS Content development manager, provides a starter for ten.

BS covers general purpose systems and products pretty thoroughly, but cannot cover facility-specific systems and products to the same extent, though it does make an effort. For sports facilities, for example, NBS offers the following work sections: Swimming pool water treatment systems, Swimming pool timing and scoring systems, Special surfacings/pavings for sport/general amenity, and Play and sports equipment.

Where else can the specifier go? There is a wealth of information out there. Here we concentrate on playing surfaces, spectator seating, lighting and fixed equipment.

General sports organisations

Sport England is a good place to start. It publishes Guidance Documents for general and individual sports, and employs a Design Advisor.

For indoor surfaces, Sport England publishes Floors for indoor sports. For outdoor surfaces, Sport England (with SAPCA) publishes the three-part document A guide to the design, specification and construction of multi-use games areas (MUGAs) including multi-sport synthetic turf pitches (STPs). Synthetic surfaces seem to be of very wide interest. The Sports and Play Construction Association offers a raft of publications dealing with synthetic sports surfaces, including: Code of practice for the construction and maintenance of artificial grass sports pitches, Code of practice for the maintenance of synthetic sports surfaces, and Code of practice for the construction and maintenance of athletics tracks with synthetic surfaces. For natural turf, Sport England publishes Natural turf for sport. The National Playing Fields Association's Sports turf must be good, at £70!

On lighting, the NPFA publishes Floodlighting of outdoor sports facilities, and SAPCA publishes Tennis floodlighting: Effective system management.

Guide documents dealing with fixed equipment include SAPCA's Code of practice for the construction and maintenance of fencing systems for sports facilities, and Sport England's Changing and lockers.

Individual sports organisations

The Sport England website includes links to individual sports organisations, many of which publish technical material that will be useful to specifiers.

On artificial turf, again, see the Football Association's Guide to artificial grass pitches for
community use, and the International Rugby Board's Regulation 22: Performance specification for artificial surfaces for rugby. FIFA publishes the FIFA Quality concept for artificial turf guide and the International artificial turf standard.

The International Tennis Federation has published Court surface classification, and Approved tennis balls & classified court surfaces, linked to a List of classified court surfaces. See also SAPCA's (with Lawn Tennis Association) Code of practice for the construction and maintenance of tennis courts. Meanwhile, the LTA itself is "working to make more information available to help you decide" about the right court surface. The International Badminton Federation's Specifications for international standard facilities stipulate flooring, overhead clearance, and so on.

Rules for individual sports often address the playing surface. For example IRB Rule 1.1 states: "Type of surface. The surface should be grass but may also be sand, clay, snow or artificial grass. The game may be played on snow, provided the snow and underlying surface are safe to play on. It shall not be a permanently hard surface such as concrete or asphalt. In the case of artificial grass surfaces, they must conform to IRB Regulation 22". For athletics, the International Association of Athletics Federation's Competition rules contain a number of relevant technical requirements, such as: "Unless [the running track] is a grass track, the inside of the track shall be bordered by a kerb of suitable material, approximately 5cm in height and minimum 5cm in width".

Examples for lighting include the LTA's Floodlighting CD-ROM, and the International Hockey Federation Guide to the artificial lighting of hockey pitches.

For fixed equipment and the like, see LTA Guidance Notes B1: Indoor tennis structures, B2: Indoor courts building brief - Traditional, and B3: Air supported structures (aka airhalls). The Football Licensing Authority and the Football Stadia Improvement Fund publish relevant material. The FIH Rules of indoor hockey include Pitch and equipment specifications. See also the FIH Indoor hockey and facilities handbook.

Standards organisations

Where would specifiers be without standards? For indoor sports surfaces, the central standard is BS EN 14904:2006 Surfaces for sports areas. Indoor surfaces for multi-sports use. Specification, which superseded BS 7044 Artificial sports surfaces. It is one of a series of Standards promulgated by CEN Technical Committee TC/217 'Surfaces for sports areas'. Another, for outdoor surfaces, is BS EN 14877:2006 Synthetic surfaces for outdoor sports areas. Specification. The SAPCA European Standards for sports surfaces might be of interest here.

The principal standard for spectator seating is BS EN 13200 Spectator facilities, which covers layout criteria for the spectator viewing area and the service area, separating elements, seats, telescopic stands, and demountable (temporary) stands.

The basic general standard on the topic of sports lighting is BS EN 12193:1999 Light and lighting. Sports lighting. However, CIE produces some sports-specific standards, including:

CIE 45-1979 Lighting for ice sports
CIE 58-1983 Lighting for sports halls
CIE 67-1986 Guide for the photometric specification and measurement of sports lighting installations
CIE 83-1989 Guide for the lighting of sports events for colour television and film systems
CIE 112-1994 Glare evaluation system for use within outdoor sports and area lighting.

Though there are many standards dealing with loose equipment, few deal with fixed equipment. One such is BS EN 13451 Swimming pool equipment, which covers ladders, stepladders and handle bends, pool fittings for water treatment purposes, starting platforms, lane lines, turning boards, water polo goals, leisure water features, diving platforms, diving springboards and associated equipment, and moveable pool floors and moveable bulkheads. Another is BS EN 1176 Playground equipment, which covers swings, slides, runways, carousels, and rocking equipment.

Technical information organisations

Finally, a number of organisations offering technical guidance to the construction sector publish some material dealing with sports facilities. For example, on spectator seating there are BRE Information Papers IP 4/00 and 5/00, which deal with the dynamic response of retractable and permanent cantilever grandstands, and the DOE's Interim guidance note on temporary grandstands. A handy overview of sports lighting is provided is provided by Abacus at www.lighting4sport.com/lightinglevels.htm. Another useful document is the Society of Light and Lighting's LG4:2006 Sports lighting.

Though one can contact these information providers individually, many of them make their material available on The Construction Information Service, a joint IHS/ RIBA Enterprises product which is linked to from within the NBS. Other relevant publishers represented on The Construction Information Service include DfES, PWTAG, Architectural Press, FSADC, RECSU, Sports Council for Wales, and the Scottish Sports Council. For more information, see http://uk.ihs.com/products/standards/cis.htm.

Written June 2007