Steel helps field a winning team

January 18, 2022

When health and fitness are in the lineup, a steel building is game-ready.

Community organizations, private enterprise and municipalities are continually looking for ways to deliver recreational options under increasingly challenging budgetary constraints. While using a steel structure offers many benefits over using lumber or concrete building materials, it’s well worth considering just how economical and sustainable they are over more traditional capital investments.


Today, recreation facilities aren’t just limited to playing to a single purpose playing surface, like an ice pad or basketball courts. Facilities are now expected to be multi-purpose community centres, complete with cafeterias, changing and shower areas, office space and storage, along with enough room for operational logistics and maintenance.


Read more about our dedicated sports buildings.


A sports facility that wins on cost, performance and looks

Long gone are the days of a community-run recreation facility looking like a barn or something that belongs in a random field back in the 1970s. You'll be able to choose exciting architectural designs with an exterior finish that impresses and gives your prefabricated metal recreational building the modern look you want. With meeting rooms and other accommodations made to increase the popularity of your centre, it will become a monument of pride for your community.


One of the biggest physical benefits to prefabricated recreational steel buildings is the large clear spans they provide at an affordable price. This clear-span capability is one of the leading reasons why steel outperforms traditional building materials such as concrete or wood. Steel’s superior strength-to-weight ratio can allow for up to 90 metres (300 feet) of clear space for a recreational activities. By offering this large span, prefab steel buildings are ideally positioned for multi-purpose athletic buildings, field houses and community centres requiring open space. Structures relying on wood and concrete materials would require support columns to cover an equal span, limiting use. Columns and supports are potential hinderances by breaking up space and restricting design plans.


Internally, steel buildings create greater flexibility for installation of bleachers or walkways along the walls for the benefit of spectators. Depending on the use at the time, this flexibility also provides the opportunity for mobile seating, allowing even greater potential for the accommodation of spectators, or even using multiple playing surfaces concurrently. Imagine the potential of this flexibility, and the window of opportunity it opens to revenue-generating activities: tournaments, inclement weather contingencies, elite training accommodation.


Cold-form buildings are fully customizable to suit your needs and are built to spec. Pre-engineered structures can also handle higher roof pitches as well as mezzanines. High ceilings permit higher performance athletics, better ventilation and more space for additional floors to allow more activities, training areas and administration. The full-metal construction also contributes to overall sustainability through their long lifecycle, little to no maintenance and incredible durability. 


Whatever your sport, you’ll get the facility you need

We love sports and its shows. Summit Steel Buildings has experience in creating venues for all types of sports, summer and winter. Whether you need a single-pad, multi-pad ice arena (ideal for figure skating, short-track speed skating, curling or hockey) or a multi-purpose facility that offers a variety of programming (such as soccer, football, lacrosse, track and field, basketball, volleyball or Ultimate Frisbee), we can build whatever you imagine. By accounting for a wider variety of recreational programs, including swimming and aquatics, your facility will become a popular and busy destination that creates a positive community atmosphere.


Get ready to play! Once you’re at the starting line for your athletics facility project, contact Summit Steel Buildings and we’ll get started. We’re your one turnkey provider that focuses on providing you with the most suitable cost-effective solution to your building needs. 


About the author

Darren Sperling has specialized in the engineering and delivery of pre-engineered steel buildings for over 15 years and has experience in over 20 countries worldwide. He can be contacted at Summit Steel Buildings at (877) 417-8335, by email at darren.sperling@summitsteelbuildings.com or on LinkedIn.


Darren Sperling, Frank Melo and U.S. team member, Ryan McQuaid, exhibited at MetalCon
By Frank Melo • October 21, 2026
Our perspectives from MetalCon, the key place for the construction sector to meet, network and show off the latest in steel building innovation and technology.
Pre-engineered building systems lets you customize your structure in a way that building kits can't.
By Darren Sperling • October 13, 2026
Significant differences exist between prefabricated building kits and custom pre-engineered steel buildings that can have a lasting impact on costs and performance.
Ryan McQuaid, sales representative in the U.S. for Summit Steel Buildings
By Darren Sperling • September 21, 2026
Introduce yourself to Ryan McQuaid, a Miami man with a steely eye for service. He's responsible for steel building sales within the U.S.
Good building design creates environments that allows people to concentrate on their work
By Frank Melo • September 8, 2026
Large commercial spaces can be overly loud. Simple techniques and materials can improve facility acoustics to create optimal workplaces letting people focus on tasks.
Turn an ongoing occupancy rental expense into an investment in your company
By Darren Sperling • August 18, 2026
Building your ideal storage facilities increases capacity, revenue and operational efficiency while creating a valuable long-term fixed asset.
Greater American representation further solidifies Summit Steel Buildings’ long-standing commitment
By Frank Melo • August 10, 2026
We're boosting our metal construction services across the U.S. with a physical office in Miami to help serve clients coast to coast.
Business value in construction means reducing downtime for operations.
By Darren Sperling • July 24, 2026
Pre-engineered steel building construction means less downtime to get businesses into operations earlier and earning revenue sooner.
Rather than limiting design, steel systems provide a framework that allows architecture to shine.
By Frank Melo • July 14, 2026
Pre-engineered buildings provide design freedom for exterior concepts that shape a building’s character by balancing mass, proportion and materials.
Hyperscalers race to build the next generation of AI infrastructure
By Darren Sperling • June 18, 2026
Canada's AI infrastructure opportunity is one of the biggest construction stories of the next decade. Many facilities will need to be built.
Nathan Rourke has established himself as one of the CFL's most prolific dual-threat quarterbacks.
By Darren Sperling • June 9, 2026
With their first overall pick in the 2026 Draft A Lion program, Summit Steel Buildings selected the CFL’s most outstanding player for their associated sponsorship.