Bridgetown makes most of multi-million-dollar sport hub that came out of the blue
On a humid evening at the end of July 2024, 90 children from more than 30 communities converged on one of Canada’s top synthetic running tracks for a speed camp run by an Olympic sprinter.
Organizers had been hoping for 25 participants, so the huge turn-out was surprising. The real surprise, however, was that the event took place in Bridgetown, N.S., a small community in the Annapolis Valley.
“This is a field of dreams,” says Phil Marsh, an esteemed Ottawa running coach and marathoner who retired from his position as Running Room’s regional director and moved to Bridgetown in the spring of 2024. “We are very fortunate to have a facility of this calibre. It’s up to us to maximize the ways we use it.”
According to Murray Freeman, vice-president of the non-profit Annapolis County Outdoor Sports Society (ACOSS), the community is also very fortunate to have a coach of Marsh’s calibre. “It was a stroke of luck for us when Phil heard that we had a volunteer coaching opportunity,” says Freeman. “He took the time to visit and was so impressed with the track, he decided to move here.”
Freeman works with Marsh and other members of ACOSS to manage and operate the new Bridgetown Regional Outdoor Sport Hub Park, a facility that includes the eight-lane track, a natural turf field, LED lighting, resurfaced tennis and pickleball courts, runways for triple and long jump, and a steeplechase water jump. Often described as one of the top five tracks in Canada, it is a game-changing asset for both Bridgetown and Nova Scotia.
The starting line
When asked how Bridgetown came to have a multi-million-dollar outdoor sporting facility, Freeman says the story begins with the demolition of Bridgetown Regional High School — and with it, the only running track between Kingston and Annapolis Royal.
He explains that the normal course of events in securing a community resource is for a group of interested citizens to band together to advance their agenda. The push for Bridgetown’s sport hub proceeded in a very different way, beginning in 2017 when then Premier Stephen McNeil announced plans for the project during the opening of the Bridgetown Regional Community School.
“Our new track was built without a citizen group driving the effort and the county inherited a resource it didn’t have the capacity to handle,” says Freeman. “After attending to various aspects of the track and its surroundings in an informal way, our group proposed a management agreement with the county and entered into a five-year renewable lease in January 2024.”
Passing the baton
Annapolis County Warden Alex Morrison recalls initial discussions around the Bridgetown Regional Outdoor Sport Hub Park. “When a group of citizens approached county staff asking to be involved, council agreed that it would be better to have the facility managed and operated by a distinct and experienced group,” he says.
Warden Morrison attended two public consultation meetings in the spring of 2024 and saw unanimous support for the sport hub. “I am absolutely elated to see it develop to this point,” he says. “Although it is located in Bridgetown, it serves people across the province and is an important asset for all of Nova Scotia.”
Something for everyone
Runners and those who support them are clearly not content to sit still. ACOSS recently received a grant to build a connector trail between the Bridgetown Regional Outdoor Sport Hub Park and the Harvest Moon Trail, and there is already excitement about planning ultra-marathons that run from the sport hub to Annapolis Royal and back along the rail trail.
For non-runners — a demographic to which Murray Freeman claims to belong — there’s equal excitement about a new chimney built in the sport hub park to replace one lost during the demolition of the old high school. Thanks to the new chimney, Chimney Swifts have a smoke-free place to roost as well as enthusiastic spectators who applaud the annual arrival of this species at risk.
“The sport hub has something for everyone and is a real draw for the area,” says Freeman. “Our next project will be collecting data to demonstrate that the community is already seeing a return on the investment in this facility.”
With the sport hub’s parking lot filled to capacity on most evenings, and a world-class track that continues Bridgetown’s storied history of track and field, the value of this investment is already clear on many levels.
For more information, check out the Bridgetown Regional Sports Hub
www.bridgetownsportshub.com
