Artificial Turf vs Natural Grass- The Knockout Punch

We have heard a number of people post on this blog and elsewhere about how much cheaper it is to maintain artificial turf vs natural grass. But, that is only part of the story. You have to look at the whole story, or the life of the surface in order to make an informed decision on this.

Please read the following links and tell me if you reach the same conclusion I do:

http://turf.uark.edu/turfhelp/archives/021109.html 

This site is found at the University of Arkansas division of Turfgrass Science. From the link:

It is a myth that synthetic fields require less maintenance than natural turfgrass fields or to say that artificial turf fields are maintenance free. Synthetic fields require 1) additional infill, 2) irrigation because of unacceptably high temperatures on warm-sunny days, 3) chemical disinfectants, 4) sprays to reduce static cling and odors, 5) drainage repair and maintenance, 6) erasing and repainting temporary lines, and 7) removing organic matter accumulation. In a recent presentation by the Michigan State University, Certified Sports Turf Manager, she cited that the typical annual maintenance costs of her artificial turf fields ranged from $13,720-$39,220, while the typical annual maintenance costs of her natural turf fields had a similar range of $8,133-$48,960.

Disposal costs
When artificial turf (in-fill systems) needs renovating every 8-10 years, there is a hidden cost of disposal. Because the field is filled and top-dressed with a crumb rubber material (typically made from ground automobile tires), the material may require special disposal. Disposal costs are estimated at $130,000 plus transportation and landfill charges (3).

http://cafnr.missouri.edu/research/turfgrass-costs.php/ 

This site is the University of Missouri College for Agriculture, Food, and Natural Resources. From the link:

Fresenburg said there is a national trend toward high schools and parks and recreation departments installing the synthetic fields. Often the low cost of maintenance is a reason cited for the investments.

"Don't let anyone come around and say it's for cost reasons," Fresenburg said. "Maybe they can say they'll have more events. That's true. I can't argue with that. No natural field is ever going to stand the same amount of use as a synthetic field."

http://www.naplesnews.com/news/2008/aug/09/new-football-fields-replacing-grass-artificial-tur/

This last article is the most interesting. This school district in Florida has decided to rip out its existing grass fields and replace them with turf. Total cost is over $6 million! But that is not the funny part.


A guy late in the article suggest that the school district will save a whopping $10,000 per field a year in maintenance. This school district has 7 such fields that have been or will be replaced. Let's do the math. A savings of $10,000 per year per field for 10 years (the life expectancy of artificial turf) would be....drum roll please...$700,000.

Even if you accept the idea that the school district will save $10,000 a year on maintenance, they will pay $6,000,000 to save the $700,000! Why would they do that? Because the $6 million is in their fund balance and it doesn't impact their ability to pay salaries to teachers and administrators.

This last article is very much the position we find ourselves in here in Mt. Lebanon. We have a couple of bucks in our municipal fund balance and a vocal handful of sports people are demanding that we use that money to turf a school district field. Personally, I don't want to pay $1,000,000 to turf a school district asset in order to save $10,000 a year in maintenance costs. That math just doesn't work! Over ten years Mt. Lebanon taxpayers will end up $900,000 short for every field that gets artificially turfed. What I would like to see is the sports people do research like what has been done here. They should tell us how much we spend to maintain our fields and build the financial case for artificial turf. They should also build the environmental case and the use case. None of that has been done.

Now I realize that the Arkansas article was sent in before by Chuck Bachorski, co-president of Mt. Lebanon Girls' Softball, to this blog under Turf War, but I felt that it needed to be mentioned again. When we all met, Chuck stressed how hard on the knees and how hot artificial turf gets.  Thanks again to Charlotte and Chuck for working together.