Red Hook might soon have its own version of Friday Night Lights.
A Manhattan high school is planning to refurbish a haggard football field on Columbia Street, installing synthetic turf and bright lights making nighttime games or practices a new possibility.
Xavier High School recently completed raising $1.5 million for a restoration of the field in Red Hook Park, according to Phil Abramson, a spokesperson for the Department of Parks and Recreation. All the work must be done to meet Parks’ specifications, Abramson said. “Right now Parks is working with Xavier on our specs and a design,” he noted.
The school recently presented its plans to the Parks Committee of Community Board 6, which unanimously supported the project. At its Oct. 14 meeting, the full board also voted to support the plan. After the design is completed, Xavier will go back before Board 6 for final approval. “This is a win-win situation,” said CB 6 member Glenn Kelly. “There will be a net gain for the community.”
Since the 1930s, the private, all boys Jesuit high school located in Chelsea has used the fields as a practice site for its football team, the Knights.
Ray Hall, the co-founder of Red Hook Rise, a youth organization, said the Knights won’t be the only team to gain from the spruced up field. The Brooklyn Saints, for example, a youth league run out of his organization, will also benefit. “For Xavier to come in and do this, it’s a good deal for the community, as well as for Xavier.” Hall said other teams have no problem arranging their schedules around the school. Anything is better than playing on the field as it stands now, he said. “It’s really terrible — there are holes in the field, no drainage. We need a good safe field where kids can play.”
Rod Walker, Xavier’s Athletic director, told the Board 6 committee that the field could be used for football or soccer. The field would be used by the school after school and on weekends — four Saturdays for the football season, which spans from September through Thanksgiving. The turf and the lights are expected to make the field more accessible to the community and other groups using the field.
Walker did not give a time frame for the finalized plan.
Typically, the turf will last up to 20 years. The city would be responsible for maintaining the field. Abramson has said that Xavier would be responsible for paying for the entire project.
John McGettrick, the co-chair of the Red Hook Civic Association, wondered what the impact of a cement plant currently being constructed just a stone’s throw from the field would have on the athletic experience. “Good to have a field that’s renovated but at the same time, it does raises question of safety of field itself, in light of cement plant being erected across the street.”