Monterey upgrades Laguna Grande soccer field with artificial turf.

On a sunny Monday afternoon, spry soccer players kick a ball around a bright green field on the Monterey side of Laguna Grande Park.

The soccer part isn’t new – people have been practicing and playing pick-up games on this field for years. But the green part is.

“That field was torn up every year to the point it had to be re-sodded, and the sod would be torn up within the first month,” says Lou Marcuzzo, Monterey parks operations manager.

About $300,000 later, crews have engineered new drainage and installed an artificial turf soccer field.

The funding includes about $230,000 from the city’s Neighborhood Improvement Project Committee, $50,000 from California American Water and almost $16,000 from Monterey Peninsula Regional Park District, Marcuzzo says.

The city’s youth soccer teams had been using fields on the Presidio, which has become harder to access due to amped-up security.

The new turf doesn’t require any water. But it also means less habitat for geese.

Chris Hartzel, vice president of the Audubon Society Monterey Bay Chapter, isn’t worried: “There’s plenty of food around for the geese.”

The city of Seaside was facing similar issues with a field on its side of the park, where soccer players kept tearing up the sod. In 2011 the city planted trees, spaced to discourage games.

Marcuzzo says the new turf on Monterey’s side will improve the neighborhood, and may also deter homeless people from camping nearby.

“Any time you add youth activities to a place,” he says, “it seems to brighten it up a little bit.”