It is always the City's goal to provide high quality and safe fields. Unfortunately, some conditions require the City to close fields for short periods for safety reasons and to avoid extensive damage to City facilities.
As a general rule, sports fields are closed for a minimum of 24 to 48 hours after a rain event. This usually means that the fields are closed the day it stops raining and the following day. Starting with the second day, the field conditions are evaluated to determine when they can be reopened.
The conditions at our sports parks vary greatly. For instance, Hero's Park tends to have wetter soil conditions because it is in a flood plain and has clay soils that tend to retain water instead of allowing free flowing drainage. At the other end of the spectrum are the fields at the Lake Forest Sports Park where the City designed the soils under the natural turf fields to have better overall drainage. After a rain event, the City groups local parks based on the soil conditions and this can result in some fields being reopened sooner than others.
Athletic use of wet or saturated natural turf fields can be unsafe for users and may cause extensive field damage resulting in field closures and costly renovations. Please use good judgment at all times when using our fields.
The following applies to all natural turf fields.
To check whether fields are open at any given time, contact the City's Fields Hotline at (949) 461-3595. The hotline is only updated when fields are closed for maintenance or because of inclement weather.