It”™s almost game time as the Sono Field House comes within a month of being completed.
And it promises to be more than sports and event facility, according to its owner.
“We saw that there was a great demand for a facility for youth sports and high school sports in the area,” said James Quinn, CEO and founder of Sono Field House.
Quinn, president of Q Properties of Norwalk and a father, found himself having to drive an hour-plus to bring his children to decent sporting facilities.
“When you have children who are involved in sports and you”™re sitting on 95 or the Merritt, it”™s the wrong time of day and there”™s bumper-to-bumper traffic you think why,” Quinn said.
For Fairfield County, Norwalk is the prime location for a centrally based facility, which will include 52,000 square feet of space on Ely Avenue.
Q Properties is building the project and worked with Norwalk firm J.G. Rogers Architects on the design.
“I looked for the dirt for around four years,” Quinn said. “But the idea has grown and has become more than just geared toward youth and high school sports, there”™s a huge opportunity here to develop leadership and team building programs in our operations here for professionals.”
Â
Dev Pathik, director of corporate programming for Sono Field House, said the space has been developing a curriculum which will be the driving factor of the facility once opened.
Â
“We”™re going to be working with midlevel and senior level management and then employees who have some need to improve the way they collaborate,” Pathik said. “We”™ll have groups of 12 and we”™ll have groups of 1,200. There are three levels in our programs; feel like a team, act like a team and perform like a team. Corporate teams are the only competitive teams on the planet that don”™t practice on a regular basis.”
According to Pathik, the facility”™s corporate program incorporates a ropes course that runs along the roof of the facility as well as a rock climbing wall. The facility also includes three full-size fields with retractable curtains to accommodate different needs.
“The building and the space is very adaptable,” Quinn said.
Â
The facility will also include media rooms, a video screening room, rock climbing centers, and a caf̩ satellite location of Tribeca Coffee House from NorwalkӪs Main Street. Pathik said the fields are designed to accommodate several field sports with program directors to parallel each of those sports.
Quinn said the Field House will be working with schools and nonprofits.
Â
“We”™re projecting three quarters of a million endorsements each year,” said Pathik. “If you look at the ripple effect of that it”™s amazing.”
Pathik estimated the facility will end up employing 300 to 400 part-timers each year and 70 to 80 full-time employees.
“On a lot of fronts this project fills a need for a lot of people,” Quinn said.
He encountered a number of hurdles in bringing the project to fruition.
“To change the zoning we had to come up with a really good program,” Quinn said. “We also of course hit a really hard time in the finance markets where for the most part the lending community was shut off. We persevered and were able to get our funding. Though once we achieved our financing we were able to get good pricing with the lack of construction projects going on. We feel fortunate from a construction standpoint we were able to reduce our costs and remain within our timeline.”
Â
According to Pathik, the facility was able to achieve financing eventually because of the facilities diversified plan.
Â
“We weren”™t just a sports complex,” Pathik said. “In the end we could say that we had meeting rooms and a coffee shop and after-school programs and summer camps; they were able to see that the business plan was one that would work. To Jim”™s credit he saw that it had to be more than a sports complex.”
Quinn said the support from Norwalk officials has been phenomenal.
“Since we first started the project they were very supportive of us,” Quinn said. “They saw the opportunity just like we did of creating a very special asset within the community.”
Pathik said that Norwalk”™s hotels are already showing interest and are excited to be able to offer the facility as one of Norwalk”™s assets to their guests.
Sport clinics and leagues at the youth and adult levels are already scheduled for the opening fall and winter session at Sono.
