Tosa's Hart Park track repaired, city saves for field turf replacement

Routine maintenance can be key on a costly investment.

The same could be said for the artificial field at Wauwatosa's Hart Park, located south of State Street at 72nd Street.

Maintaining the turf

The turf experiences heavy usage throughout the year, said Director of Public Works Bill Porter — about 1,200 hours in total. The field and surrounding track are commonly used for high school and college football games, soccer, field hockey, and men and women's lacrosse, among other things, making regular maintenance a necessity, Porter said.

The turf field, which carried a five-year warranty after its $750,000 installation in 2009, does receive routine maintenance, Porter said. The field's infill which contains rubber that crumbles through use, and can get pushed to one direction of the field. Porter said the rubber crumbs can be swept and redistributed again through the maintenance.

But too much maintenance could be a bad thing, Porter said.

"You don't want to go out there every week and start messing around on it," Porter said, adding the field's fibers can be torn up and damaged if too much maintenance work is done. "You can work it too much. You don't want to work it too much."

The turf, manufactured by global company FieldTurf, has a life span of about 10 years, said Porter, adding it will likely be replaced in 2019. However, Porter, who is retiring in May 2016, said the decision to replace the field will ultimately be up to his successor. It's possible that come 2019, the field could be in good enough shape to last another year or two, pushing back the replacement, Porter said.

In the meantime, the city has been setting aside money every year in anticipation of the 2019 turf replacement at an estimated to cost of about $1 million, Porter said.

"We are on target for having cash to pay for the new field," Porter said.

Repairing the track

The eight-lane track at Hart Park has also seen its fair share of use over the years.

The track was repaired for $18,125 this fall, said city Finance Director John Ruggini.

The work done was repainting track lines and repairing cracks along the track's turns and where it joins with the infield, Porter said.

"We're pretty well squared away on the field," Porter said, adding the repairs were done at the expense of the city and under its warranty.

The track is supposed to have a useful life of 20 years, Ruggini said.

The new athletic facilities at the park were unveiled in fall 2009. The $4.2 million project expanded the running track, reconstructed tennis courts and put the synthetic turf on the athletic fields, among other upgrades.