{"id":31957,"date":"2022-09-22T18:28:07","date_gmt":"2022-09-22T22:28:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=31957"},"modified":"2022-09-22T18:28:09","modified_gmt":"2022-09-22T22:28:09","slug":"athletes-slide-into-new-home-on-former-hallmark-lands","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/athletes-slide-into-new-home-on-former-hallmark-lands\/","title":{"rendered":"Athletes slide into new home on former Hallmark lands"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Local baseball and softball players will have more opportunities to play close to home following the opening of a new sports hub on the former Hallmark lands.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Located on Industrial Parkway South between Engelhard Drive and Vandorf Sideroad, the two softball diamonds, along with associated washrooms, shade structure, and parking lot were formally dedicated by Mayor and Council on the evening of September 13.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Approved by the 2018-2022 term of Council, what to build on the Hallmark lands was subject to lengthy debates at Town Hall with user groups and politicians alike presenting differing views on how the land would best benefit local sports communities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Two softball diamonds, however, ultimately won the day and area teams had nearly two weeks to break them in before the formal dedication.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAurora King Minor Baseball was instrumental in moving this project forward and giving us some direction as to how to address their needs,\u201d says Al Downey, Director of Operations for the Town of Aurora. \u201cThe ball diamonds are modified in order to maximize use by as many user groups as possible, so even though they are ball diamonds, the infield will accommodate both softball as well as baseball.  The Aurora Diggers [women\u2019s softball team] is on there, softball leagues are on that diamond as well. The design is maximized opportunity for permitting and use by as many groups as possible.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The addition of these diamonds into the Town\u2019s roster of recreation facilities \u201cnow provides an opportunity for youth that are in Aurora to play in Aurora and that\u2019s always been the goal: to provide an opportunity,\u201d Mr. Downey added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThere\u2019s always a constant foundation with regards to baseball use, but now that the Jays are doing well, there\u2019s increased interest and you\u2019ll find that there\u2019s even more kids coming out and playing ball. These diamonds will go a long way in addressing their needs.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While teams get their feel of the new facilities, the Town is looking at how they will be used to see if they might be suitable for \u201calternative uses\u201d as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a beautiful piece of land,\u201d says Mr. Downey. \u201cIt\u2019s got ample greenspace with it as well, in addition to the diamonds themselves, a beautiful washroom, changeroom [and] as the park goes up and people come to it, we\u2019re probably going to be finding other uses for it, but right now that\u2019s not on the table or even part of the discussion, only because it\u2019s still pretty unfamiliar to people and I think next season will then start spurring some of those conversations.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Construction for the new ball facility began in April of 2021 and was supposed to open this past May, but supply chain issues, challenges related to grading and hydro, and lingering questions related to the global pandemic resulted in a delay of approximately four months.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Despite this, Mr. Downey says the project came in under-budget.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis was really good work between Council, staff, and user groups, supported by documentation within our Parks & Recreation Master Plan and even though there was a lot of debate, and sometimes it seemed to go on for some time, I think at the end of the day people are very happy we got to this point,\u201d he says. \u201cWe\u2019re at this point together and I think it is going to bode extremely well for the future of youth in Aurora, baseball and softball in particular, and it certainly does set us a good framework on how we should engage the community and move forward with facility development.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Brock Weir
Editor
Local Journalism Initiative Reporter<\/strong><\/p>\n\r\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Local baseball and softball players will have more opportunities to play close to home following the opening of a new sports hub on the former Hallmark lands. Located on Industrial Parkway South between Engelhard Drive and Vandorf Sideroad, the two softball diamonds, along with associated washrooms, shade structure, and parking lot were formally dedicated by […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":31958,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-31957","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general_news","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/2022-09-22-05.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-8jr","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-16 13:18:25","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31957","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31957"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31957\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/31958"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31957"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31957"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31957"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}