EXPANSION: John Hunt Park to acquire new turf fields, parking lots, and facilities

Published: May. 27, 2022 at 4:40 PM CDT

HUNTSVILLE, Ala. (WAFF) - Two synthetic turf fields, two new parking lots, and an additional locker room building and press box. You can expect this and a lot more for John Hunt Park Championship Fields. Thursday evening City Council approved to a deal worth almost 16 million dollars to expand the venue.

City Administrator John Hamilton says its been a project eight years in the making.

“It gives us more capacity for every day use by our local clubs and teams and leagues and things. But then also, it’s really designed to be able to host large tournaments and things,” Hamilton says. “So I think it’s going to make it just another venue that the Sports Commission and the CVB can market to bring in tournaments whether it’s lacrosse or soccer or ultimate frisbee or anything like that that can use those fields.”

If you ask Mark Russell, executive director of the Huntsville Sports Commission, he’ll tell you he wants lacrosse there the most. But of course, that’s not where the buck stops. He sees the potential to host Southeastern Conference soccer tournaments. The city has bid on it before.

“We’re right in the middle of the SEC footprint, we want to host some friendly competitions, international-type competitions in soccer. We think Joe Davis Stadium will be a great opportunity for that. And we want to host just any national meet that we can get and can bid on.”

Once the project is underway, it is under contract to be completed in less than 400 days.

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