I’ll be curious to see if this gets a lot of attention on the EMU homepage and other places promoting “Education First” here: “Local news: EMU to break ground for indoor sports facility.”
Oh, and while the first story I came across was in the Detroit Freep, here’s a link in the Eastern Echo with a few more details.
This project is long overdue. EMU is the only school in the Mid-American Conference (MAC) without such an indoor facility. Most others are far more lavish as well. The price is a very small fraction of what is being spent this year on renovation and new construction of academic facilities on campus. ($3 million versus $140+ million)
Official EMU press release:
“New EMU multi-purpose facility expands opportunities for year-round sports”
http://www.emich.edu/univcomm/releases/102009bubble.html
And if you have 24 minutes to spare (I don’t, personally, at least not on this), take a look at the EMU video of the ground-breaking ceremony:
What struck me was the cost of the facility. This is far less than what was originally desired, and for the cost, EMU should get a lot of bang for the buck, especially if we can connect to the community for events, etc. Of course, let’s hope they don’t go with the company that built the Cowboy’s indoor facility that came down in bad weather.
The article regarding the facility has been in all the papers and the comments from the readers have not been positive. I think EMU has made a great decision. All those who make fun of the team and don’t support them really need to go to one game. I think you will find its alot of fun. The poor quality of play is actually fun to watch. However, the event itself is actually fun as well. The band, cheerleaders, concessions, cannon, Video board are all first class. Everything about the environment is as it should be for a division 1 program. The only thing that is missing is people in the seats. Students get in free and tickets are a cheap as 3-9 bucks. They deliver alot for a small price. Lets hope this bubble does the same for the program. $4 million is a small price compared to the 20-30 million that Central and western have spent for similar facilities.