The Best Seats
In The House

Our most recent project brought us to the Township of Sables-Spanish Rivers, a quaint community nestled between Sudbury and Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario. The township is situated in the foothills region of Lake Huron’s North Shore and was officially incorporated in 1998.

The site of the project landed us at the Massey & District Community Centre, which encompasses a standard-sized baseball diamond, a fully enclosed outdoor basketball court, a single arena ice rink pad with full canteen service, as well as a licensed hall with a full kitchen for special events and rentals.

The township called on us to aid them in updating the bleacher seating located inside the ice rink before the upcoming hockey season began. The existing arena bleachers were out of date and unfortunately no longer compliant with recent updates in the Ontario Building Code. After the details were received, our designers got to work designing the new bleachers to be installed at the community centre. Some customization was needed as the new bleacher structure had to be notched out around the columns of the pre-engineered building.

Located in Belleville, Ontario, our most recent project landed us at Bayside Secondary School. As a member of the Hastings & Prince Edward District School Board (HPEDSB), Bayside prides itself on academic, artistic and athletic programming paired with a heavy involvement in their local community.

Bayside Secondary School resides on a 200-acre campus, the largest in North America, which includes a quarry, wooded trails, extensive athletic playing fields, as well as a picturesque shoreline on the Bay of Quinte. The school is also home to HPEDSB’s French Immersion program and also offers a number of other specialty programs including International Studies, Communications Technology and EcoBound.

Our most recent project brought us to the picturesque town of Brockville in southeastern Ontario. Located in the heart of the 1000 Islands and St. Lawrence Seaway, Brockville is home to many services and amenities that can be found in a large city, but still manages to maintain its undeniable hometown charm.

The site of our recent bleacher installation was at one of the city’s main recreation complexes and parks. Memorial Park belongs to the Memorial Park Recreation Complex which, has one of two arenas in the area and is home to the Brockville Braves Junior A Hockey Club and the Brockville Tikis Junior B Hockey Club. The ice surface at the complex is in use between the months of September and April of each year and in the off-season, is used by community groups for trade fairs, multi-cultural events, dog shows and other special events.

One of our most recent installation projects took place in Brockville, Ontario in the beautiful Thousand Islands region in the southeastern part of the province. Working closely with the esteemed team at Bourgon Construction, our designers got to work on a new grandstand seating system that would accommodate additional spectators at the Thousand Islands Secondary School’s (TISS) athletic events.

TISS proudly pushes each and every student to work hard at realizing their true potential both academically and athletically. Home of the Pirates, the athletic program at TISS spans across a variety of sports teams including cross country, basketball, cheerleading, football, golf, hockey, volleyball, figure skating and track and field.

Last summer, we were commissioned by the Algoma District School Board to replace and upgrade the existing telescopic bleacher systems at three separate schools. This summer, we were again commissioned to do the same at an additional two schools under the same board.

The first site was at Elliot Lake Secondary School in Elliot Lake, Ontario and the second was at W.C. Eaket Secondary School in Blind River, Ontario. Both schools were previously equipped with wooden bleachers that needed to be removed and replaced by a state-of-the-art telescopic bleacher system. Much like the three schools completed last year, these two schools were in need of an upgraded seating solution for their growing sports programs in their gymnasiums. The school board once again turned to our team at Sport Systems to design, supply and install what would be their future bleacher seating for years to come.

Our recently completed project was on behalf of the Hastings and Prince Edward District School Board which currently serves over 15,000 students and borders Maynooth, Deseronto, Prince Edward County and Quinte West in southeastern Ontario.

Our latest project took place at Centennial Secondary School located in Belleville, Ontario, an institution based upon three main values which it embeds in its students, faculty and community. These values are: Academic Excellence, Athletic Prowess and Artistic Integrity; encouraging their student body to improve and develop literacy and numeracy skills, sportsmanship qualities and artistic creativity, which fosters the development of their self-awareness and self-confidence.

The annual Puppets Up! Festival just wrapped up this past weekend in our hometown of Almonte, Ontario. The three-day festival runs each year during the month of August where puppets and performers provide hours of entertainment for families and children of all ages in the town’s historic downtown.

While downtown’s Mill Street was lined with vendors, live music and puppet performances, the main attractions took place in a number of tented theatres and inside some of Almonte’s historical buildings. Complete puppet performances took place at various times throughout the weekend in these designated locations, pleasing spectators from start to finish.

As with your vehicle or any other piece of machinery or equipment, properly scheduled maintenance is a sure-fire way to get the most out of that product’s life cycle. The same holds true for athletic equipment and infrastructure, whether that equipment has mechanical or moving parts or is simply stationary.

Larger-scale projects such as bleacher and grandstand seating are often overlooked, but require a good deal of attention. These large structures are often located outdoors 365 days of the year and while they are built to withstand terrible weather conditions, they too require regular maintenance to ensure your spectators are always safe.

We have compiled a quick checklist that can be used at any time of the year and hopefully on an ongoing basis that will help you and your facility maintenance staff perform routine checks.

As a company, we strive to offer our existing, current and prospective clientele the very best in sports and athletic infrastructure and areconstantly updating, tweaking and expanding our product offering to best serve our growing market. One large area of expertise our team proudly presents our clients with is upgrading outdating equipment in older facilities and operations. Often times, these upgrades arise due to safety issues or concerns, while other times they can simply be the by-product of technological and functional advancements in the design and construction of certain pieces of equipment.

One of our largest areas of upgrades exists within educational facilities. These facilities serve hundreds of participants and a variety of events each year and the athletic locations such as gymnasiums within these facilities require a multi-use approach to their equipment and fixtures.

Removing the barriers experienced by children with physical and mental disabilities was the goal when the Miracle League first started in April of 2000 in the state of Georgia. The idea behind this incredible organization has spread like wild fire and now consists of over 240 Miracle League Organizations serving over 200 000 children and adults who might not otherwise have the opportunity to play the game of baseball.

The Miracle League brings a unique angle to the traditional game of baseball that allows participants to blossom, not only as players, but as individuals. The proven ‘buddy’ system the league employs pairs each disabled player with an able-bodied player and fosters new friendships, skills and tremendous confidence in all who participate.

In the summer of 2012, a local Ottawa family approached both the Champions for Ottawa Baseball and the Orleans Rotary Club with expressed interest in bringing a Miracle League to Ottawa to support their son Bryce’s love of baseball. Bryce, who was born with cerebral palsy, wanted dearly to partake in a baseball league and his parents, Rolly and Michelle Desrochers, set out to make his dream a reality.