Last month saw the unofficial christening of Tennis Canada’s new Rexall Centre at York University in Toronto, when Canadian tennis star Daniel Nestor, a 2000 Olympic gold medalist in doubles, lobbed a ceremonial first serve as a warm-up to the Masters Tournament that followed. The new facility, designed by Robbie/Young + Wright Architects, includes the 12,500-seat Stadium Court and the 16-court Compass Group Centre of Excellence.

The outdoor stadium incorporates 6,000 premium seats, 150 President’s Club suite seats, 48 exclusive sky-lounge suites, and 5,500 upper seats on temporary bleachers for tournaments. The center will be active year-round; its ground floor houses the headquarters of Tennis Canada, which administers the sport for the whole country, and the Ontario Tennis Association. The adjacent Compass Group Centre of Excellence has 16 courts, including four hard structures and four air-supported bubbles. The center will also host community programs, provincial team training, coaching certification courses, and national and provincial high-performance programs.

“The new Rexall Centre will be a catalyst to develop tennis in Canada,” says Michael Downey, president and CEO of Tennis Canada. “It will provide world-class training facilities for our athletes and it will generate more revenue.” After years of providing meager facilities for international tennis, Canada now can attract world-class competitions. Wimbledon winner and world No. 1 Roger Federer, defending champion Andy Roddick, and Andre Agassi were three of the international stars playing at the Rexall Centre for the Masters Tournament last month.

Parabola for sight lines
Richard D. Young, Hon. FAIA, principal-in-charge at Robbie/Young + Wright Architects (RYW), and project architect David Wang, both avid tennis players, ensured ideal sightlines by giving the bowl-like stadium a parabolic curve. The seating rows start with a low rise that gets increasingly steeper as the rows ascend. Spectators can see part of the run-out area (the boundary around the play area) as well as the court. “Spectators will be as close as they can be to the play without impeding it,” Young says. “This enhances the symbiotic relationship between player and spectator that is the essence of a good stadium.”

Another popular feature replicated from a previous stadium is the concourse, which was high enough so that people could circulate inside the bowl, or stand and watch, without disturbing the players. Instead of entering the bowl at ground level, spectators ascend to the concourse level, 35 rows above center court. The sole public corridor external to the bowl, it focuses food, retail, and restroom areas into a single, wheelchair-accessible zone. “If these activities are split up all over the place, it’s more difficult to give good service,” Young says. From this corridor, spectators make a truly grand entrance into the bowl, with dramatic views of seating above, below, and across.

Neutral in appearance
Responding to York University’s design criteria, Young kept the building fairly neutral by using precast concrete and galvanized steel in screens, as well as details that keep a low profile. Corrugated sheets of galvanized steel clad the Centre of Excellence. To decorate the stadium for tournaments, 40-foot-high posters of tennis stars hang from the eight corner stair towers to add a festive touch.

During elimination matches, the temporary Grandstand Court seats 7,000 spectators. Some 2,000 to 3,000 fans watch elimination matches at each of the side courts. As the tournament progresses, activity shrinks until only the main stadium remains active for the finals.

Urban attraction
In addition to designing the stadium and Centre of Excellence buildings, RYW master-planned Tennis Canada’s 20-acre site at the edge of the York University campus. Tennis Canada initially envisioned the stadium at the south end of the site, but Young suggested moving it to the northern boundary, along the street line, to give it a more urban feeling. Spectators approach the stadium after passing through a central piazza, where people rendezvous and look up players’ scores. Retail and food stands wrap the south end of the piazza, with courts at both the south and north end. The campus skyline looms in the background.

Beyond the piazza, visitors see the restored Rabbit’s Creek. Formerly a storm culvert in need of environmental remediation, the stream now broadens to form a swale that retains and purifies storm water and attracts waterfowl. Non-native trees were replaced by native, sustainable species appropriate to the site. “The woodlands and creek surrounding make it quite an attractive site,” Young says. “The natural setting and the towers establish a strong individuality for the centre—it’s ‘tennis in a park.’”

The Rexall Centre broke ground a year ago, maintaining a rigorous construction schedule to bring the project in on time and on budget. A $5 million second phase over five years will add a second row of sky lounges, additional seating on the outdoor courts, and other site enhancements.

Copyright 2004 The American Institute of Architects. All rights reserved. Home Page