‘Outsiders' visiting the Yorckdreieck quarter of Berlin will have a hard time finding the newly constructed football pitch. They have to look up, as the pitch is built on the roof of the do-it-yourself building material market belonging to the Hellweg Company. The planning office Kemper from Dorsten was awarded this special project. The team here has specialised in the field of leisure-centre planning and landscape architecture for more than 20 years. When managing director Bruno Kemper was first offered the project for the exterior design of the DIY market he was thrilled that it also included the football pitch 12 m high where, after completion, the youngsters from the nearby urban districts of Kreuzberg and Schöneberg, would play.
"A sports field on the roof doesn't come along every day", says Bruno Kemper and adds that he first needed to find a suitable partner who could provide professional support for the implementation of the plan. "Our intention was to create a pitch which during play, looked and felt like natural grass. In addition, it was important to us to keep the risk of injury as small as possible and to achieve an excellent optic. All these conditions were satisfied by a synthetic turf pitch" explains Kemper. Trofil was soon determined to be the suitable partner for this task. The team led by managing director Eike Wedell not only manufactures high-quality synthetic turf pitches according to natural ideals, they also carry out the complete installation work right up to handing over the keys. "Awarding the contract required specific criteria to be fulfilled", states Bruno Kemper explaining the procedure for selecting a supplier. "The company needed to have comprehensive know-how, high competency in solving problems and a high-performance team. Trofil was able to fulfil all these points!" he remembers.
As space is limited in the city centre of Berlin, a request came from the district parliament Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg, to install the sports field on the roof. This means that the building needed more than a conventional roof and now has a strong concrete roof which provides soundproofing for the DIY customers while satisfying all eventualities from a structural point of view. "The weight of players, snow, construction and rainwater loads were calculated right from the start so that everything would function perfectly with regard to static loading", explains Bruno Kemper. One particular challenge was the final installation of the synthetic turf. This product developed by the Trofil Company provided the best solution as practically no difference can be felt between play on it and natural grass. Apart from its wear resistance, the filler material used also provides further advantages: For the 3700 m2 large pitch, environmentally compatible rubber granulate was used in addition to quartz sand. This mixture is especially play oriented, prevents injury to joints, provides a pleasurable running feeling and gives good ball bounce and roll behaviour. Implementation of this project presented a challenge for Trofil but no problems! Using a special crane, all construction material including the rolls of synthetic turf, was heaved onto the roof. No large construction equipment could be used as transport to the building site was simply impossible. "So we needed lots of manpower, to compensate for the lack of machinery," states Bruno Kemper. A further decisive factor was the time limit imposed by the contractor. As the planner and landscape architect mentions, "Trofil had only four weeks to complete the synthetic turf pitch – a very racy time schedule." The experts based in Hennef put on a real turn of speed however, so that the pitch could be inaugurated as planned. Trofil will be present at the FSB trade fair in Hall 11.2, Stand S051.
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