Reopening Considerations

Reopening Considerations for Campus Recreation

Facilities

A detailed operating plan that serves as an essential guide for managing a progressive return to operations. The operating plan should be a living document informed by the best available guidance and consider social distancing guidelines to establish operational hours, areas of operation, amended capacities, revised cleaning and sanitizing protocols.

The phases of your facility reopening will be determined by your local government and advanced through institutional recommendations. Individual institutions may have more or less than three phases and each institution’s phased reopening may look different than another.

Phase 1

This is the initial opening phase and designed as the most restrictive phase. The framework within this phase will remain flexible to permit any necessary accommodations or addendums in response to state and local health guidelines along with industry best practices for facility management.

Phase 2

This phase of facility reopening would see some ease of restrictions on capacity and program availability while still maintaining appropriate state and local guidelines for physical distancing and best practices for facility cleaning and sanitation. Moving into Phase 2 is not a time-based change. Entering into subsequent phases must rely on guidance from the CDC, your local government leadership, and local health officials. Moving to the next phase should also be based on your facility and the institution’s confidence in your ability to implement COVID-19 prevention measures, containment, cleaning, staff, and operations management.

Phase 3

This phase would see a return to normal operation in both scope and scale while still maintaining best practices for facility cleaning and sanitation.

Considerations:

  • Start reopening communications with what areas ARE available before sharing what is not
  • Will there be changes to lockers or cubical storage
  • Are you limiting what a patron can bring into the facility?
  • What changes affect showers and changing facilities?
  • Communicate area closures where activity does not allow for physical distancing
  • Will you be closing unsupervised areas of a facility?

Considerations:

  • Remove or deactivate hand scanners
  • Can you have patrons scan their own ID to access the facility?
  • Use entry or exit stations or another type of physical barrier to facilitate appropriate traffic flow
  • If you have more than one door, designate one as the entrance and one as the exit
  • Consider limiting access points to only one entrance and one exit
  • Can you modify the entry to use toe openers or install automatic door openers to reduce hand contact with doors?
  • Place a physical barrier such as a six-foot table in front of the reception desks in facilities to maintain distancing between staff and patrons
  • Determine whether patrons will be permitted to bring in bags or other personal belongings
  • Examine the possibility of designating specific times for at-risk or vulnerable populations to use the facility

Considerations:

  • Utilize a reservation system and accommodate first-come walk-up access up to capacity
  • Create 60 to 90 minute work out time periods.  At the end of each time period, all patrons must exit for staff to perform a 15-minute facility cleaning prior to the next time block.
  • Use separate ingress and egress access points for distinct facility rooms
  • If possible, and not in violation of fire code, prop doors open to improve air flow circulation
  • Utilize touchless card swiping with barcode scanners
  • Implement time limits on cardio equipment
  • Allow individual workouts only, supersets or exercises that require a spotter or should not permitted

Considerations:

  • Strength and cardio equipment may need to be reconfigured, taped-off, or be temporarily removed or relocated to follow recommended distancing guidelines
  • Changing the direction of how a patron enters and exits equipment
  • Special consideration should be given to equipment where a patron may come into contact with the piece with their head or hands (e.g., head pads or hand grips)
  • Personal training staff should clean equipment before and after use by clients
  • Only having equipment such as boxing gloves and shadow mittens available for purchase and not a check out item
  • Remove porous, shared equipment from the floor (i.e., bands, mats, physioballs, bar pads, ropes)
  • Replace porous equipment grips with non-porous grip material
  • Handles made of soft or absorbent material, including those found in certain cable attachments, suspension equipment, and functional training tools, should not be used
  • Sports equipment check-out should be suspended or limited
  • Yoga participants should bring their own mats
  • Remove vanity items in bathrooms until it is safe to share common items
  • Determine if policies and procedures for “Lost and Found” need to be adjusted

Considerations:

  • Follow your local government and institutional guidelines
  • Use your construction documents to determine updated capacity numbers for each space in your facility
  • The number of patrons allowed in each facility will be based on the number of patrons per sq/foot to follow physical distancing guidelines
  • Closing unsupervised fitness spaces and or facilities (i.e., residence hall fitness centers, multi-purpose courts, outdoor fields, outdoor fitness spaces)

Considerations:

  • Create spacing markers for people waiting to enter and check-in
  • Create defined markings to indicate individual user spaces in group fitness studios or wherever group fitness classes are held
  • Suspend informal recreation use on multi-purpose sport courts
  • Redraw floor plans for physical distancing
  • Determine physically distant pathways for entry and exit through main facility access points, hallways, and activity areas to ensure demarcation.
  • Determine an appropriate location in each building for isolating a participant or group; ideally this space would not be available for any other use
  • Lifeguards should not be tasked with enforcing physical distancing rules
  • Remove portable bleachers to prevent people from congregating

Considerations:

  • Rearrange Pilates reformers, chairs, barrels, and other equipment to allow clients to safely practice Pilates
  • Some equipment may have to be removed from your space to meet the guidelines
  • Asking patrons participating in Pilates and yoga to remove their street shoes outside the studio
  • Rearrange or remove stationary bikes
  • Utilize a reservation or ticketing system to manage access
  • Mark a grid pattern on the floor to show exercise spacing
  • Use a separate entrance and exit point
  • Use multi-purpose courts as a larger space to promote distancing for classes

Considerations:

  • Determine if it is required or recommended for staff to wear PPE while cleaning (i.e., mask, face shield, gloves)
  • Policies regarding cleaning and sanitation of equipment should be created for each area of the facility with clear instructions regarding how equipment will be cleaned, which products should be used and a clear delineation of staff and participant responsibilities
  • Cleaning stations and appropriate signage may help with compliance
  • Equipment should be cleaned by staff on a regular schedule
  • Be familiar with all warranties for fitness equipment and ensure that use of particular products for cleaning do not violate conditions of the warranties unless absolutely unavoidable
  • Encourage patrons to use provided cleaning materials before and after equipment use
  • Cleaning supplies and hand sanitizer should be readily available for staff and customers in multiple locations around the facility, especially in high-use areas
  • Determine process for assessing usage rate of supplies and determining frequency of re-ordering
  • Consider closing the facility at least one hour earlier than normal in the evening to permit staff adequate time to clean the facility
  • Use EPA-approved disinfectants for cleaning
  • Explore electrostatic cleaning machines or ultraviolet lighting systems
  • Increase the frequency of emptying the trash in each facility
  • Suspend use of air circulation fans
  • Work with your facilities department to control temperature and humidity via the HVAC system
  • Determine protocols for laundry in consultation with appropriate institutional departments such as Student Health or Environmental Health & Safety

Send your ideas or questions to NIRSA Headquarters

Download NIRSA Reopening Considerations as a PDF

Access Example Reopening Plans