The Jerry Richardson Stadium and Athletic Complex offers student athletes of the University of North Carolina at Charlotte well-equipped training spaces to prepare for football season, as well as a 15,000-seat stadium for fans of the Charlotte 49ers to gather on game day. The new stadium captures everything game day is about, from tailgating to hospitality spaces, to great sightlines for viewing the action on the field, with wide concourses and convenient amenities to add to the overall fan experience. 

To prepare the project site for the eventual stadium, the team needed to remove massive rock formations to accommodate the foundations, utilities, and the field. Scanning technology was used to verify rock quantities and assist the blasting process. The team worked closely with the client to implement strategic blast times and blasting levels that were below recommended tolerances to not interrupt nearby classroom lab experiments. Blasting activities were completed as several smaller blasts to minimize the impact to the campus. We also used a monitoring system to measure ground accelerations to confirm the construction activities did not harm any experimental data. While PCL’s slow and steady blasting approach took more time, the team was still able to achieve substantial complete of the practice fields and associated facilities in time for the football team to move in and begin practice on schedule as promised.