joseephuss
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http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/17/s...ield-of-dreams-still-comes-up-short.html?_r=1
At Bronx High School, Field Is 20 Yards Short of Being a Home
For decades it has been an inconvenience bordering on embarrassment. Herbert H. Lehman High School, with an enrollment of more than 4,000 students in the Bronx, has never played a home football game simply because its field, at 80 yards, is too short for regulation contests.
The result, over the years, has been extra travel for student-athletes — the team plays all of its games on the fields of other schools — and an understandable difficulty in building school spirit and support.
An end to the problem seemed to be at hand several years ago when the New York City Department of Education granted the financing for renovations of athletic facilities at a number of high schools, including what would become nearly $5 million to overhaul Lehman’s multipurpose athletic complex.
When the work is done — the renovations began in earnest last fall and are set to be finished this September — there will be new bleachers for fans, lights for night games, a new artificial turf field and the school’s first new softball diamond.
But there is a hitch: the refurbished multipurpose field will remain 80 yards long, 20 yards shy of full size. And so, 38 years after Lehman first began its football program, there will still be no such thing as a home game. Same for the soccer and lacrosse teams.
At Bronx High School, Field Is 20 Yards Short of Being a Home
For decades it has been an inconvenience bordering on embarrassment. Herbert H. Lehman High School, with an enrollment of more than 4,000 students in the Bronx, has never played a home football game simply because its field, at 80 yards, is too short for regulation contests.
The result, over the years, has been extra travel for student-athletes — the team plays all of its games on the fields of other schools — and an understandable difficulty in building school spirit and support.
An end to the problem seemed to be at hand several years ago when the New York City Department of Education granted the financing for renovations of athletic facilities at a number of high schools, including what would become nearly $5 million to overhaul Lehman’s multipurpose athletic complex.
When the work is done — the renovations began in earnest last fall and are set to be finished this September — there will be new bleachers for fans, lights for night games, a new artificial turf field and the school’s first new softball diamond.
But there is a hitch: the refurbished multipurpose field will remain 80 yards long, 20 yards shy of full size. And so, 38 years after Lehman first began its football program, there will still be no such thing as a home game. Same for the soccer and lacrosse teams.
