WITH the current redevelopment of Alberton Oval underway, Port Adelaide Football Club provides an update on the application to upgrade the sports lighting.

To support our football programs, the club needed to provide elite training and match day facilities for our AFL, AFLW, SANFL teams and Academy programs, and this includes an upgrade to the sports lighting at Alberton Oval.

The existing lights are over twenty-five years old and use significantly dated technology. The proposed lighting will boast state-of-the-art LED technology, that will not only improve lighting for the oval itself but importantly will reduce light spillage beyond the oval footprint, ensuring the impact on neighbouring properties will be reduced when used for training purposes.

Following feedback, Port Adelaide revised the original design submitted to the City of Port Adelaide Enfield Council’s Assessment Panel (CAP) prior to Christmas and have since reduced the height of the towers to 39 metres, while still maintaining the advanced lighting technology to minimise lighting spillage outside the oval footprint.

This revised design, which is compliant with all planning rules and regulations, has been approved by Council, and Port Adelaide is now progressing with the construction.

The AFL, AFLW and SANFL teams will utilise the new light towers for evening training sessions (between April – October). These sessions will be limited to approximately three nights per week, and rarely will the lights be on past 8pm.

The new sports lighting will also provide the opportunity to schedule a small number of AFLW and SANFL night games at Alberton Oval.

If night home games are included as part of our AFLW or SANFL fixtures, Port Adelaide will communicate directly with the community well in advance of these games. In addition, we have developed a series of protocols to minimise impact, such as lighting levels and times of operation.

Work will commence on the installation of new the light towers in the week commencing Monday 13 March. This will include the preparation of the tower foundations which requires piling at four locations around the oval.

The piling of the four posts at each location will take approximately twelve days per tower site (four total), and approximately three of those days the machinery used for this part of the construction will create noise and possible vibrations. The piling machine will be transported to site via a float. To safely move the machinery on site, the council has approved a series of temporary road closures which will be in place between the hours of approximately 10am – 12pm (two hours) on specific dates across the course of the build.

The first of these road closures will take place on Brougham Place next Wednesday, March 15 between approximately 8am – 1pm, and the club will notify you on the dates and times of the further road closures in the coming weeks.

Anyone with any queries or concerns, please contact rmchaffie@pafc.com.au for further information.