Recognized as an International Centre of Excellence thanks to its fully accessible design and inclusive environment, the Abilities Centre truly is one of a kind.
Located in the Greater Toronto Area in beautiful Whitby, Ontario, the 125,000 square foot facility boasts sports, fitness, arts, and life skills programming for people of all ages and abilities.
In addition to a board room, games room, lounge, theatre, 200m indoor track, aerobics rooms and a universally accessible exercise area, the facility is home to three regulation-size basketball courts.
This is where our team was fortunate enough to lend a hand to this amazing facility. Given the variety of participants that frequent the basketball courts, the existing portable backstops were no longer deemed inclusive for all to enjoy. Those who enjoyed the sport from a wheelchair or suffered from other disabilities soon found these floor-mounted systems to be hazardous to their safety.
Given these circumstances, the operators approached our team looking for options to remedy the problem. They were interested in removing the portable basketball systems and instead, installing some state-of-the-art ceiling-suspended basketball systems to alleviate the risks associated with what was currently in use.
The challenge was with the architecturally designed ceiling that featured dramatic sweeps in heights ranging between 60 feet and 30 feet. Each of the systems would need to be secured to the ceiling above and allow them to raise them up and out of the way when not in use.
Our design team was up to the challenge and with the measurements provided, worked with the engineering team to finalize a plan that would see these systems installed over a 10-day period.
Given that the facility was extremely busy during the day, our team was tasked with working overnight so as to not disrupt the regularly scheduled daily programming. In the end, our team was able to have the systems installed, inspected and tested ahead of schedule.