PINE GROVE – Rock Hill Board of Education members are sending architects to the drawing board one last time for plans to construct an athletic facility for the district’s new high school.

Friday, October 20, 2000

PINE GROVE – Rock Hill Board of Education members are sending architects to the drawing board one last time for plans to construct an athletic facility for the district’s new high school.

Bids for construction of the estimated $2 million project are expected out by the end of this year, superintendent Lloyd Evans said.

"The board approved the design and development phase of the new football stadium," Evans said. "We’re now working on the actual detailed construction plans for the facility. Once the (blueprints) are finalized, we’ll be placing them up for bids."

Additions to the stadium’s original plans increased estimated costs to $600,000 more than originally anticipated, he said.

"We originally estimated the costs for the new facilities to be somewhere around $1.3 to $1.4 million," he said. "But, we’ve realized there have been several problems with the current stadium and we’ve tried to address them with the new plans."

Seating capacity became a real issue during the design and development phase, Evans added.

"Our current facility can only handle about 1,000 people on the home side," he said. "With additional seating, the home side of the new stadium will have somewhere between 2,600 and 2,700 seats – more than two and a half times the capacity of the current stadium."

He said the current plans will include an eight-lane track around the football field.

The new track will be topped with an all-weather covering to withstand all weather conditions, he said.

"This type of track is supposed to be the toughest and best track available," Evans said. "We’ve also added a metal storage building that will be used to house all the track equipment when it’s not in use."

But during the design phase, the number of restrooms available to the public became a serious issue, he said.

"That’s been a big problem with the present facility and particularly with the women’s rooms," he said. "For the new stadium, we’ve added a considerable amount of restrooms right at three times as many with one additional building as an alternate."

If the district can afford plans for the alternate building, it would give the new stadium four times as many restrooms available than the current athletic facility, he added.

The new playing field will be lighted by a four-pole lighting system on concrete-based aluminum poles.