It’s the crossover between the summer and winter seasons with local sport, and Council has been working hard to make sure our fields are ready for play.

New drainage has been installed at four local sports fields as part of our commitment to improve the playing surface of ovals across the Coast.

Chittaway Oval, Gavenlock Oval at Narara, Rogers Park at Woy Woy (fields two and three), and Baker Park at Wyong have had drainage installed to improve the quality of the field and increase usage rates.

The new drainage will see water quickly disappear from the surface of the field during wet weather, and enable the field to dry out faster after rain - this means after a downpour, people can use the field for training and playing a lot sooner than what they used to.

Additionally, irrigation was installed and relevelling carried out at both Rogers Park (fields two and three) and Gavenlock Oval to encourage stronger turf establishment and growth resulting in faster rehabilitation of the playing surface.

We have been working with the local sporting clubs who use these fields, and appreciate their patience as we relocated them to other facilities while we carried out these improvement works.

Improvements are also continuing at Baker Park, as contractors replace the roof on the grand stand. Visitors to Baker Park are asked to be mindful of the work, which is expected to be finished in April.

Our staff have been working hard this month to prepare our sports fields for the 2017 winter season. We have added a rye grass seed to some of our high use ovals that will help maintain the playing surface throughout the season.

A number of fields are also having new goal posts installed that are better quality, and will make it easier to move around them around the field and protect the playing surface.

By making our fields more available for use, our community can stay healthy and active, and utilise these community assets during wet periods.

With all the wet weather around, some ovals aren’t getting the chance to dry out, and are holding the moisture a bit longer than others before getting topped up by the next downpour of rain. Users are asked to contact their local sporting clubs to find out if their oval is open or closed following any rain.