6A
NEWS
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
FRIDAY OCTOBER 24, 2008
presented by THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
CAMPUS
Center addition dedication today
BY HALEY JONES
hjones@kansan.com
KU students will have access to more basketball, racquetball, badminton and multipurpose courts in a few short weeks when the addition to the David. A. Ambler Student Recreation Fitness Center opens.
The 45,000 square-foot addition will also provide students with a golf simulator, martial arts room and multiple courts where they can play sports such as dodgeball, cricket, soccer and floor hockey. The track has also been extended to one-fourth of a mile long. The center is scheduled for dedication today at 3 p.m.
Mary Chappell, director of recreation services, said that despite the many delays and difficulties in construction, the center was only a few weeks away from opening.
Chappell said excessive rain caused construction problems when workers discovered they had not applied a product that kept out moisture. The moisture was enough to slow down construction
Rainwater prevented construction workers from pouring the floors of the multipurpose courts, which will be composed
new area stats:
Total size: 145,000 square feet
of a synthetic material similar to that of the running track. Chappell said the amount of moisture in the floors of the multipurpose courts was decreasing by about a pound per week.
Ryan Waggoner/KANSAN
Track length: 1/4 mile
Six wooden multipurpose courts that can be used for basketball, volleyball and badminton
Two synthetic (track-like material) courts for hockey, soccer, dodgeball and cricket
A group of students decided to take advantage of the rainwater and designed a 5,000 squarefoot rain garden with more than 2,500 native plants. The $40,000 rain garden was funded by Student Senate, a grant from the Kansas Department of Health and Environment and KU Recreation Services. It is the largest student-designed and constructed landscaping project on campus.
"We're using water rather than getting rid of it." Porter said.
England Porter. Independence senior, said the rain garden would help manage the runoff water created by the recreation center.
The extension of the running track sits above the basketball and multipurpose courts and connects with the existing track to provide a quarter-mile track for students.
See more of the Ambler SRFC expansion as www. kansan.com/galleries
Roger Heimerman, assistant
@ KANSAN.COM
options for student programming and events. He said the new track could be blocked off for groups such as ROTC or intramural sports teams to work out or practice on.
main, assistant director of facilities and membership, said the new courts and track provided Recreation Services with many more
The intramural sports clubs, which have been practicing in Robinson Center during construction of the addition, will return to practice at the Ambler Center when it opens.
The floor of the new addition to the David A. Amber Student Recreation Fitness Center is seen from above before the dedication ceremony, which will be held at 3 p.m. Friday. The new addition to the Student Recreation Fitness Center features two new basketball courts, a multipurpose court, two new raquetball courts and a new martial arts room, as well as an addition to the current track, which will stretch the total length to a quarter of a mile.
They will use the new martial arts room for practice because the old martial arts room was turned into an extended weights area.
Chappell said two of the scoreboards were already damaged when
they were delivered, so Recreation Services sent them back to be rebuilt. She said they were scheduled to arrive next Friday.
"You can't control those kinds of things," Chappell said. "We didn't want to accept something that wasn't good."
Another hiccup in construction came when Recreation Services determined that the area built to house the golf simulator would not be big enough.
Heinerman said the ceiling was too low and the lights would have been hit during the backswing of
the golf club. He said that once the golf simulator arrived, it would be relocated to the northeast corner of the building, next to the multipurpose courts.
Chappell said that the area originally meant for the golf simulator could be designated for stretching or stationary bikes, but that the staff would wait to see how students used the area before installing any equipment.
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
"We're going to watch and see what you guys are going to do," Chappell said. "Stretching room is like storage — you can never have enough."
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN AND KU ATHLETICS are SEARCHING FOR THE NEW GAMEDAY T-SHIRT FOR THE STUDENT BODY.
We Need You
to help us come up with a new gameday slogan. The top 3 finalists will receive:
1st Place: iPod Touch,
A piece of the Final Four floor
& A 3 pack of posters from the '52,'88 & '08 Championships
2nd Place: iPod Nano & 1 EA Sports Game
3rd Place: iPod Shuffle & 1 EA Sports Game
GOTO to submit your ideas KANSAN.COM/THESHIRT
Chappell said a sound system would not be installed until winter break, but students could still hear music through the intercom system.
Edited by Arthur Hur
NATIONAL Coast Guard rescues two more Alaskan fishermen
JUNEAU, Alaska — Searchers on Thursday headed to the site where two fishermen were missing after their vessel sank in frigid and storm waters off Alaska. Five other crew members died and four were rescued.
Coast Guard rescuers pulled the survivors from a life raft about 15 hours after the distress call. They were rescued in 43-degree water near the Amchitka Pass, which links the Bering Sea to the Pacific Ocean about 1,400 miles southwest of Anchorage.
A C-130 airplane and a Jayhawk helicopter were dispatched to search for the men still missing from the sinking of the Katmai, which sent a distress signal around 1 a.m. Wednesday. The aircraft were to arrive by midmorning.
The crew's survival suits, physical condition and their efforts to keep one another semi-warm and awake all could have helped them endure, said Coast Guard Petty Officer Levi Read.
It wasn't clear what happened to the 93-foot Katmai. The Coast Guard received an e-mail from another boat saying the Katmai had lost steering and was taking on water. Read said.
"They were in good spirits and in good shape" Read said. "They asked to stay, so they could continue to help with the search."
One of the bodies found was recovered by a fishing vessel that helped the Coast Guard with the search.
The Coast Guard reported 10-to 15-foot seas in the area, with winds from the north at 34 mph. The area had a mix of rain and snow.
The Katmai was carrying a load of cod and heading toward Dutch Harbor on Unalaska Island, Read said. Dutch Harbor is 800 miles southwest of Anchorage.
Associated Press