Premier Sports Campus to add lights

The Premier Sports Campus at Lakewood Ranch will begin installing lighting for eight of its fields Sept. 6.

“The lights make us very unique in that we are the only local facility that is privately owned that has playing fields with lights,” Lakewood Ranch director of sports Tim Mulqueen said. “We have clearly separated ourselves from the competition with the combination of some of the finest fields in the country, and lights on eight of these fields. We can now be host to at least nine national events – events that will be massive in terms of economic impact and exposure to the area that we could not have secured without lights.

“Several professional teams have committed to our campus due to the lights, which allow for trainings in the evening when heat is not a factor,” Mulqueen said. “The commitment to adding the lights has turned the PSC into one of the top training and playing venues in America.”

Home and Willis, Inc., an electrical contractor based in Parrish for the past 18 years, will head the $1.1 million project. The company will install Cooper All-Star state-of-the-art sports floodlights that feature industry-leading, computer-designed optics with internal glare and spill light control. There will be four, 70-foot light poles per field.

Although lightning was not one of the initial phases of the project, Schroeder-Manatee Ranch president and CEO Rex Jensen said the market has determined the direction in which new amenities are added.

“When we built the Sports Campus, we initially built the fields only,” Jensen said. “Our assumption was that our customers would tell us which improvements were most important to them. The vast majority has spoken overwhelmingly in favor of lights and we agree with them.

“Our commitment to lighting the fields is generating recurrent business sufficient to justify the investment,” Jensen said. “We knew that the Sports Campus would place us at the epicenter of field sports activity in the region, if not the state. This facility is the real deal in economic development. Many others are ‘fugazis’ by comparison.” 

Lighting installation should be completed by November.