New turf to be installed at River King and Queen Sports Complex this summer

Apr. 26—CLINTON — The River King and Queen Sports Complex is getting new turf after being approved at the March 25th Clinton School Board meeting.

This process will cost 463,200 dollars but is something the school had budgeted out and knew would need to be replaced.

The athletic complex had its turf installed in 2010 and Coan Field's was installed in 2013.

Typically turf has a life span of around 10 to 15 years.

CSD has been having annual checkups on both of their turf fields and the recommendation was that it was time to replace the athletic complex.

"Towards the end of the life span, the grass looking fibers start to show ware by splitting, the rubber starts to be a little uneven and footing can be inconsistent," Director of Plant Services Paul Dotterweich explained.

Clinton has booked off the field for maintenance starting on June 3 and will not be used again until mid August.

"The process will take up the majority of the summer," Dotterweich said.

During this time, the well known turf installing company Midwest FieldTurf will come in and complete the process.

There will be three different processes, starting with taking out the turf.

"They'll come in and use a machine to pull up and extract the rubber and sand material. They'll set it aside to be reinstalled because it's still useful. It will be blended with the new materials that will come as part of the project," Dotterweich said. "After that they'll cut up the existing turf into pieces and then discard it."

After taking out the inside material and old turf, they will make sure the rocky underneath portion is nice and evenly flat before installing the new turf.

"Once the old turf is pulled up then they will regrade, level it and fill any voids before rolling it flat again," Dotterweich said. "The turf comes in rolls of 15 feet by 200 feet. They'll lay it out and then sew it together at the seams. After it's laid out they will refill the field and level it out."

Dotterweich said that the idea is that Coan Field's turf will be replaced around 2026.