D-F planning board approves Foxcroft Academy fieldhouse

DOVER-FOXCROFT — A key step was taken toward the construction of Foxcroft Academy’s fieldhouse as the Dover-Foxcroft Planning Board formally approved the project during a Feb. 4 Zoom meeting.

The $5.5 million fieldhouse project will provide dedicated space for student activities including field hockey, soccer, wrestling, track, baseball and softball, as well as future community use of the facility. Foxcroft Academy Head of School Arnold Shorey said in an email after the meeting that a groundbreaking event is scheduled for early May, and the timeframe for completion is 11 months. 

During the planning board meeting, Haley Ward Inc. Project Manager Chip Haskell said the fieldhouse project was first brought before the group about a year ago.

 “What we’re proposing here tonight is a new fieldhouse facility which would take the place of the soccer field,” he said, with the building located on the western edge of campus behind the A.E. Robinson convenience store.

Haskell said the fieldhouse is 340 by 205 feet. “This will have an indoor track,” he said showing some maps of the project. “It will serve a lot of different sports for the Academy and other events.”

“It’s been about a 30-month fundraising campaign and we have recently met our goal so we are very excited about that,” Shorey said.

The head of school said he had two points he wanted to make, including “it is a facility we are going to share with the community.” Shorey said the fieldhouse will have solar power, and he said he believes it will produce a megawatt.

“We’re trying to be as green as we can be,” he said.

Shorey said the fieldhouse will have separate entrances for student-athletes and spectators, and players will still use the existing locker rooms in the school building. He said the facility will accommodate regulation-sized playing fields for soccer and field hockey, and other Foxcroft Academy teams will be able to practice inside.

A track will be around the perimeter “and in the morning and evening it will be a walking place for the community,” Shorey said.

“The soccer field, the Alfond Field, we’re going to be moving back to that field,” he said about the playing area behind the dormitories. Shorey said the softball diamond would be rotated 90 degrees to avoid having a portion of the soccer pitch be on the infield dirt.