Foley, Ala. – (OBA) – Improved batting cages at one park and new lights at another are among the projects in the works at Foley city parks.

The Foley City Council voted recently to approve the improvements at the Raymond C. Christensen Sports Plex on Cater Lee Way. Jeff Lee, Foley parks director, said the city will improve the batting cages at five of the 10 fields at the site.

“This is one of our planned capital projects. This will be to add lights and carpet to the batting cages at the newer five-plex,” Lee said.

The project is expected to be completed by the start of the spring baseball season. The lights and carpeting will also make the cages safer since the facilities are often used after dark.

The project also includes a lightning suppression system for the site.

“We also hope to install a lightning suppression system,” Lee said. “The Event Center has had a lot of success with theirs in the last year or so. So we want to do that as well because we’ve had numerous lightning strikes to our irrigation wells, which has cost us thousands of dollars over the years so we’d like to try to install one of those.”

The batting cage improvements and lightning suppression system is expected to cost $55,000.

The council also approved the removal of old ball-field lights at Mel Roberts Park on Cedar Street.

The eight sets of lights will be declared surplus and replaced by newer systems.

“This is the old life system at Mel Roberts Park that we’re about to start and remove as part of the capital project to improve that park,” Lee said. “It’s a very old system. So this is probably going to be garbage when we get it down, but we would like to deem it surplus and get rid of it.”

Mayor Ralph Hellmich said the new LED lighting system will reduce utility costs at the park.