Extensive cabling to the Bro Park racecourse

Täby Racecourse shut down a few years ago and operations were moved to Uppland-Bro, north of Stockholm, to the new racecourse Bro Park which opened in 2016. Reka Cables is the main cable provider in the project and the customer has been very happy with the cable deliveries. The new racecourse is an investment of half a billion SEK and an extensive part of the project has been in the form of cabling from light poles and racetracks to stables and fibre networks.

Bro Park’s racecourse is four times larger than Täby Racecourse, which it replaces. The racetrack’s circumference, a dirt track and turf course, is 400 meters longer, and the curves are wider than its predecessor. The turf oval has a circumference of approximately 2,000 meters. The facility also includes training tracks, bleachers, stalls, restaurants and staff areas, among other things.

Cabling was needed to all of these new facilities. Reka Cables has delivered more than half of all cables used in the project.

A REQUEST AT THE END OF 2015

Heinz Elbert, Sales Manager for Infrastructure (electricity networks) at Reka Cables, works at the company sales office in Gothenburg. He tells us that the project began with a request at the end of 2015.

The request came from Otera Ratel, a power contractor that plans and builds station, line and cable facilities, and which had the overall electrical power contract for Bro Park.

Reka Cables has worked closely together with Otera Ratel in past projects and was their sub-contractor in the Bro Park project.

“They called us and requested a quotation for a horse track project. The request concerned underground cables and cable cabinets, switchgear and electric stations for the buildings, restaurants, a large number of light poles and stalls,” says Heinz Elbert who maintains that it was a question of a giant facility with, among other things, 25-30 stalls for both competition and training.

THE PROJECT GREW

With time the project grew and became more and more extensive. Eventually, the question was asked: “How much cable do you have in stock?”

But despite the project growing far larger in terms of cable than the original plan, all cable could be delivered on time to a very satisfied customer.

36,000 METERS CABLE ABOVE GROUND

Göran Lundstedt was the project leader at Otera Ratel and was assigned as coordinator of the power supply being put in place.

He also points out the large scale of the project. “36,000 meters of cable has been drawn above ground and we have drawn several kilometres of cable underground. 80 percent of this cable has been delivered by Reka Cables,” says Göran Lundstedt who is now self-employed with the company Ovata Kraft & Förvaltning.

He also attests to the customer satisfaction. “Bro Park has been very satisfied,” says Göran Lundstedt.

LOGISTICAL CHALLENGES

During the course of the project, however, a lot of difficult challenges were encountered, especially those of a logistical nature. “It was a concern logistically as it was very muddy at the start of the project. It was so muddy after the frost that trucks could not drive out.

We even had to fly in by helicopter to be able to work with the lighting mast foundations,” says Göran Lundstedt.

CABLES FROM THREE FACILITIES

Reka Cables delivered cables to the project from its three production facilities in Finland. The manufacturing process covers the entire production chain from raw materials to finished cable.

Each factory specialises in the manufacturing of its own product area, and common to all factories is that the products are suitable for Nordic conditions.

“The cables shall satisfy the customer’s high demands on the productivity of the installation, as well as reliability in arctic conditions,” says Reka Cables CEO Ralf Sohlström.