Soccer City in Johannesburg will host the opening and closing ceremonies as well as 8 games for the 2010 FIFA World Cup.

Soccer City have purchased 10,000m² of TERRAFLOR^® and TERRATRAK^®, not just for use at the World Cup ceremonies but to ensure their future profitability.  Soccer City have spent some 1.5bn Rand on refurbishment of this 94,700 seat stadium, which is recognised as one of the most artistic and awe-inspiring football venues on the African Continent.

A small part of this R1.5bn investment has been on the purchase of a Terraplas Turf Protection System and a temporary road surface.  This means that Soccer City can now host concerts, exhibitions, festivals, political and religious rallies etc at their facility - without damaging the most essential part of the Stadium, the turf.

Soccer City Stadium. Image courtesy Boogertman + Partners.

Independence Stadium is the National Stadium of the Republic of Namibia and holds 25,000 people and their first use of Terraplas products will be for the ‘Independence Day’ celebrations on 20^th March 2010.  After this it is anticipated that the Stadium will make great use of their system for numerous cultural events thereby creating a huge increase in revenue.

Robert Else with colleagues in Namibia.

The solution was to convert the grass field into synthetic and find the best cover system available - of course they chose TERRACOVER^® by Terraplas Plc.

LA Coliseum first parking use.

Bob Curry - President of Covermaster Inc. stated “for years we had been looking at the Terraplas range of products, which offer the same quality and longevity as the other products that we sell.  At the time we were offering products at the low end of the market, but when the opportunity arose, due to the exponential growth of Terraplas plc, we jumped at the chance to be involved exclusively with the ‘World’s No. 1 Turf Protection & Ice Conversion Company’.”

Terracover Ice

How long does it take to transform an ice arena into a concert hall or exhibition centre? If you’re using TERRACOVER ICE, mounting or demounting takes only an hour and a half:

“This part of the equipment never stops or delay the transformation process. He has no any problems with Terracover. Arena is transformed about four times per month.”

Spokesman, Arena 2000.

Georgia Dome, the home to the NFL Atlanta Falcons and a centre for special events in Southeastern USA, has installed a new playing surface, the industry leader, FieldTurf. The Georgia World Congress Center Authority, after extensive research, chose Terracover® as its new cover system. The first use of the new system was on 6 July 2003, with the field remaining covered for a full 30 days.

New FieldTurf playing surface completed July 3, 2003. A perfect Terracover® stairstep works its way across the Georgia Dome turf. "Laying and Locking" - Terracover® locks together and overlaps, making a solid, monolithic floor. Specially designed pallets hold 30 Terracover panels each.

The new stadium is state of the art in every way including the latest in synthetic infill turf systems. This, however, created it’s own headache when it came to protecting the artificial turf for all of the non-sport events - synthetic infill products are designed with loose rubber pellets as a base material making the use of traditional vacuums, sweepers or floor scrubbers impossible.

So what was the answer? The facilities engineer at Ford Field, Bob Gardner, investigated the best system to be used for both the grand opening and the Rolling Stones Concert. His conclusion? Use Terracover®… Both the grand opening gala events and the Rolling Stones ‘Forty Licks’ world tour gig in October 2002 went forward without a hitch and once again the Terraplas family of products proved to be the answer when it comes to protection of a highly valued sports surface.

Why does Ford Field use Terracover® to protect artificial turf?

• The load capacities allow any concert or special event components to be built directly onto the Terracover® flooring system.
• Terracover® provided an excellent surface for all support services (tables, chairs, production, etc.) to move cases, carts and, as needed, forklifts on the floor.
• The interlocking cams and overlapping edge design is unique among protection systems. This provides a monolithic floor.
• Cleaning is always an issue. At Ford Field a hallway floor scrubber was run over the system while it was still in place. The result? - it was clean for the next event.

Photo credits: Tom Albert and Detroitlions.com

• QSAC
• Suncorp Stadium
• The Gabba
• Skilled Park - Gold Coast

The decision of the M.S.F.A. to purchase Terraflor® was only taken after rigorous testing of every product available on the market. Their stadiums now have the opportunity to generate considerable revenue from non-sporting activities, such as high profile concerts and other
events, without damaging the playing surface.

These pictures are a selection from QSAC, together with some comments from Peter Cronin - sent to Terraplas plc following the U2 and Robbie Williams concerts at QSAC and Suncorp Stadiums respectively.