Championship Polo Field Lighting Project

The Scope of This Project Exceeded Anything We Have Ever Done.
Our client was a high-end residential development in Southeast Texas.  This master-planned community spanned nearly 2,000 acres and was home to a number of superb amenities which included a recreation center, a gymnasium, a game room, a resort pool with waterslide, and most impressively, two World Class Polo Fields.  The community planned to hold championship matches on one of these fields and decided to have a lighting system designed specifically for this purpose. 

Many Unique Elements Distinguished This Endeavor.
This was a rather unique request for any lighting company to receive, considering that only two or three polo fields in the nation have lighting systems for nighttime matches.  The client was aware that lighting a polo field essentially meant creating a unique and very rare facility, and they were more than willing to invest in this landmark facility in order to obtain the very best lighting design possible.

The project was ambitious, to say the least.  The polo field spanned the area of nearly seven football fields.  This already told us that a very high foot candle level would be necessary, and prior to even calculating the polo field lighting design, we knew that the poles we used would be laden with an exceptionally high number of lighting fixtures. 

 Lighting Design Software Enabled Us to Accommodate the Satisfy the Unique Parameters of This Project.
The client provided us with a CAD file which enabled us to calculate foot candle levels and determine exactly how many fixtures we were going to need.  The results called for an exceptional configuration.  First, we would need to create a luminance level of 50 foot candles over the entire field.  Due to the massive area that we had to light, it would be necessary to place 48 fixtures on each lighting pole.  This is far beyond industry standard configurations, and presented a formidable challenge to overcome.  The wind loading of 48 fixtures on each pole is very great, and special care was needed when selecting the proper poles.  Since this region of Texas lies near enough to the Gulf to experience tropical storms and occasional hurricane force winds, the high number of fixtures per pole amounted to a literal “wind sail” effect which represented a very unstable configuration if standard steel poles were used. 

Unique Lighting Poles Were the Key to the Success of the Whole Endeavor.
To overcome this, we designed the polo field lighting system with 100’ concrete poles.  These were the tallest and most powerful structures available for the task, and the modeling scenarios we ran in our photometric software confirmed that in spite of the high number of fixtures, these poles would provide reliable support for the lights and be able to resist the intermittent high winds that strike Southeast Texas on occasions. 

Installation was Performed by a Local Team of Sports Lighting Installation Experts
The actual fixtures and poles were installed by a partner organization whose primary specialty lies in the arena of sports and athletic field lighting installation.

RLLD Commercial Lighting carries a wide variety of industrial & commercial lighting fixtures. If you can not find what you are looking for call us toll free at 1-866-654-3961 and we will find it for you. Our home office is located in Houston, Texas with warehouses located throughout the United States that enable us to service all 50 states including Keahole, HI (KOA), Dallas, TX (DFW), El Paso, TX (ELP), Duluth, MN (DLH), Charlevoix, MI (CVX), Montrose, CO (MTJ), Telluride, CO (TEX), Dubuque, IA (DBQ), Mason City, IA (MCW), and Chicago, IL (MDW).