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Concluding CommentsDISCUSSION Refer back to the Results as Needed It seems like I did not find any new locations for soccer fields on the North Shore. If I had to pick one or two I would recommend the site at the bottom of Mount Seymour as my number one and the western most in West Vancouver as my number two. The others needed to be too high up to get enough open space and therefore will not get enough use due to the higher precipitation on the mountains. (Orographic effect.) These would be a waste of taxpayer money. The two areas that I have could recommend should give enough options for use and are in locations that are easily accessible. I am a little surprised that I couldn't find more locations to build on. I also think this problem will get worse and not better. There are more people staying active later and soccer is a great activity that will maintain fitness and health. A healthy society is a better society. My lack of options could be because I was too particular in the attributes that I felt were necessary for a good quality grass soccer field. I do not feel that this is the case. I think that I required the bare minimum. I also left quite a lenient slope value in. Hoping that if the area is chosen that the slopes can be reinforced and that the area can be graded. PROBLEMS AND ERRORS The problems with this project are reasonable I feel for a project of this size. I felt quite limited by the DEM. I found the 50m one first and was fine with using it but once I found the North Van District on of 25m the 50m didn't seem to cut it anymore. More data points would make my slope calculations more accurate. Those slope calculations were the basis for the entire rest of the project. Some of the landuse data could have been more extensive or at least a bit more detailed. For example the creeks, rivers and lakes (water) layers could have had the size or grades as well. This way I could have taken into account a variable buffer. I might not have excluded as many areas as I did. Maybe I should have left the water in and then had a consultant or developer determine whether the water could have been worked with. InterRiver Park has 6 fields all along the river. They are great fields built on the old dump. I would hate to disallow a potential area like this. Dumps are often the location for new fields. The landfill allows a flat surface to build on and they can't build anything else on it. My project did not take this into account. I did not look at the dump we are currently using and whether it is close to being closed. CONCLUSION I had a talk with Claudia from West Vancouver Parks and Recreation and she agreed that flat land is the most constraining thing on the North Shore. West Vancouver will not be building any more fields. They will now be upgrading current underused fields to artificial turf. (This of course is subject to budget constraints.) According to Claudia she can get 7 games a day on artificial turf and they use them throughout the week 24/7. A grass fields maximum is 3 per day but only for two days a week (Saturday and Sunday). I would like to do another project now and look at the current fields on the North Shore and which it would be best to upgrade. Also I would like to look at the financial feasibility of them. My soccer team plays out of West Van and they charge $35 an hour. Every week we pay an extra $70 for each game. North Vancouver charges $25 an hour for club teams. We play out of North Vancouver during the summer. Both municipalities are on a cost recovery program for these fields. There was not enough money in the budget so I believe they have to have them paid off within 10 years. If we could convert more fields, especially in Vancouver where field closures are a continual thing then more people can be active on a more consistent basis.
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