The renovated Dorothy Towne Field House includes a new 4,600-square-foot fitness center, hardwood flooring for basketball and volleyball competitions, arena seating for 500, three indoor tennis courts, a spinning room, a climbing wall, a four-lane 200-meter track, a high-jump area, and a new long- and triple-jump pit.
When people walk into the newly renovated Dorothy Towne Field House, they often comment that it looks so much larger, says Pete Zuraw, assistant vice president of facilities management and planning. But in fact, “it’s not bigger, it’s just a heck of a lot better,” he said at the building’s opening ceremony in February.
The transformation is so dramatic, it’s easy to understand why people think the space has been expanded: The formerly blue trusses have been painted a crisp white to match the underside of the new roof, and new windows have been added to the north side of the building. The field house also now includes hardwood flooring for basketball and volleyball competitions, arena seating for 500 (there was previously only room for 150), three indoor tennis courts, a spinning room, a climbing wall, a four-lane 200-meter track, a high-jump area, and a new long- and triple-jump pit.
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Perhaps the most exciting part of the renovation is the addition of the 4,600-square-foot fitness center. Cantilevered over the field-house courts, it is air conditioned (a first for the field house) and boasts 56 pieces of equipment. The Wellesley community has greeted the new space with enthusiasm: In the first week alone, the Department of Physical Education, Recreation, Athletics (PERA) counted 1,909 admits to the space. For comparison, last year PERA counted 2,300 visitors to the weight room over the course of the entire semester.
A new curtain structure that can divide the field house and the fact that the fitness center is separate allows for as many as four different activities to happen simultaneously—important because the space is used by varsity and intramural teams, PE classes, and individual users trying to squeeze in a workout.
“The faces and reactions of our students, faculty, and staff when they see the spaces—and most importantly, their daily use—have proven the importance and value of this campus renewal project for our community,” says Bridget Belgiovine, PERA professor of the practice, director of athletics, and chair of PERA.
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