In 2010, a small Kentucky town 40 miles south of Louisville took the plunge and broke ground on a 158-acre youth sports complex, hoping the project would promote tourism and spark economic development.

Three years ago, it opened with a total of 25 fully lit playing fields – half for baseball, half for multiple sports. All but two of the latter have natural grass, and there’s a rubberized diamond for the physically disabled. The complex features walking/running paths, playgrounds with cool water misting stations, and free Wi-Fi throughout the park.

The sports tourists, and their dollars, have been steadily rolling in ever since. According to a study by national market researcher Sportsimpacts, the $29 million Elizabethtown Sports Complex brought in anywhere from $11.9 million to $14.1 million in direct spending in its first year – more than half of that on hotels and restaurants alone.

Janna Clark, sports and sales director for the Elizabethtown Tourism and Convention Bureau, had estimated a $7 million overall take.

“We were extremely pleased with that figure,” said Clark, who markets the complex on behalf of the city-tourism bureau partnership.

And it is generating growth.

“It’s basic economic development,” Clark said. “We saw in other communities where they had built sports parks, other types of development in their communities. It’s happening to us now. We have a new hotel going in, with six out lots that are being shopped in the market right now. A large sporting goods retailer has opened right next to a large Hobby Lobby. In the parking lot sits a Buffalo Wild Wings. So we’re now seeing that type of development that we really didn’t anticipate seeing until five to 10 years in.”

At the same time, restaurant tax revenue is growing. “The first year we had it, we budgeted, like, $1.1 million a year,” Clark said. “I think next year’s budget for the restaurant tax is like $2.6 million. … And those dollars go right back into paying for that park.” Other tourism projects are also funded with those dollars, she said.

The project is a self-funded operation; the construction bond is paid for out of a 2 percent restaurant tax the city, which owns and operates the facility, is allowed to levy. So Elizabethtown, which operates the complex, inherited no construction costs, Clark said. Yet instead of holding its own events, it rents the facility to event owners, which teams pay to play. The park’s sources of revenue are those rentals, and revenue from its six full-service concession operations at the park.

Elizabethtown, population 29,000, had multiple advantages in the venture. The region is sports-happy. Three major highways intersect the city. It already had what Clark called a “nice pocket of hotels,” with 1,500 rooms available. Tourism bureau and city officials wanted to boost tourism, and agreed to enact the restaurant tax – which is categorized as a tourism tax from which money collected must go tourism-related projects.

The first $3 million went to renovate a downtown theater, with the understanding that the sports complex would be next. For a time, Clark said, the idea of a small convention center was floated, but didn’t gain traction. “But you say sports, and people play a little bit more attention,” she said, “because it’s a little sexier, it’s a little more interesting.”

Still, Clark said, “It wasn’t necessarily the easiest sell – because any project that is a public project that has tax dollars associated with it, it’s quite the education process to explain how it works. But now that people are seeing the success of it, it’s easier to put the pieces together and know that it was a good idea.”

Contact William H. McMichael at (302) 324-2812 or bmcmichael@delawareonline.com. On Twitter: @billmcmichael

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