Since late November, the entirety of the football and track field has been fenced off. Many students had only a poster of the changes to be expected within the next couple of years to provide information about the construction. However, school officials report that there is progress on improving the quality of the Hamilton fields.
“They’re doing great,” said assistant principal Mr. Blank. “They’re completely on time with everything they’re supposed to be doing.”
Mr. Blank added that he was proud of the team working on the construction.
“We work really well together and they’re progressing with having minimal impact to our school,” he said. “There’s places where students have to walk on a different path, but overall everything we do on a day-to-day basis here at school is still managing to move forward without being impacted by the work that they’re doing to upgrade our school.”
The main obstacle the construction has faced is weather conditions earlier this semester due to the many rainy days. For example, the deadline for the baseball field to be completed and ready to use was pushed back.
“The rain has definitely been an issue and caused slowdowns, along with having to work more quickly in other areas,” Mr. Blank said. “The best thing that we have is a really good group of people that we work with, and we have really good communication and because of that I am aware of what’s going on in any planning that we need to do. We do it together and discuss things along with trying to minimize the impact that it has on the school and at the same time try to accelerate timelines so that we can make sure that we are done when it needs to be done.”
Humanities junior Gabriel Menashe said the construction on the baseball field had a limited effect on the team’s ability to practice.
“The construction hindered our ability to practice for a couple months, but as for now it does not affect us,” Gabriel said.
The track team, which has no field access for the entire year, was impacted more than the baseball team.
SAS sophomore Ricky Arter said the team had faced some inconveniences.
“The effects it’s having are really just practices being at West LA College, which can be a little difficult as far as missing 7th to commute there,” Ricky said.
What can students expect next? While it may seem like the construction is just huge machines throwing dirt around all over the football field and what used to be the P.E. area, big changes can be expected.
“This is phase one of the project, there’s a phase two, but phase one needs to get completed first,” Mr. Blank stated. “So phase one is the track, the field, the lights, and a parking area in the back that they’re working on by the tennis courts. There’ll also be buildings that have concessions and things like that for part of the field.”
Phase one is expected to finish by March 2025. At that point, students will have field access again, and building construction will begin.
“That’s the next cool, exciting thing for people to see,” Mr. Blank said.
