Written by Carol P. Bartold

Nov. 26, 2014: While the joint flood mitigation project soon to be undertaken by the Bronxville school district and the village on Hayes Field will help solve the flooding problem that has plagued the school campus for years, it presents a new challenge: how to put Hayes Field back together and reconfigure it to make the most efficient use of limited space and best serve all students.

"There are certain indisputable facts," said Denise Tormey, board president. "We have thirteen acres, one of the smallest campuses for a school our size. We have one contiguous field area. We have explored many other options to expand field availability. We simply have nowhere to go except our own campus."

The Bronxville Board of Education continued to address the Hayes Field challenge and consider the concerns of all constituents at its November 20 meeting. Proposed plans for Hayes Field include:  (1) replacing the natural grass surface with synthetic turf, (2) increasing the size of the playing field to regulation size to accommodate boys' and girls' lacrosse, field hockey, and football, (3) redesigning the elementary school play areas to include natural grass, and (4) increasing the number of parking spaces on both the Midland Avenue and Meadow Avenue sides of the campus.

KG&D Architects, the district's architects, presented a modified plan for Hayes Field that, in response to comments from parents and residents about the loss of green space, incorporates a natural grass 25,500-square-foot play area, which would hold the kickball field, between the existing paved playground and the Hayes Field playing field area.

According to Erik Wilson, associate principal with KG&D, the plan allows some of the existing trees along Midland Avenue to remain while those trees removed to create the natural grass play area would be replaced. The plan calls for the addition of trees alongside both the new Midland Avenue and Meadow Avenue parking areas.

Wilson also pointed out that the proposed natural grass play area would require a reduction in the existing paved play area of approximately 6,000 square feet. That 24,000-square-foot playground would occupy 18,000 square feet under the modified reconfiguration plan.

KG&D's plan also addresses the perennial shortage of campus parking for faculty, employees, and administrators. The design includes a net gain of six parking spaces in the Midland Avenue lot and a net twenty-three additional spaces in a lot planned between Meadow Avenue and Chambers Field.

Margaret Mager, past president of The Bronxville School PTA and current member of the elementary school's recess committee, urged the board to reconsider adding parking to a campus already lacking play space. "If we pave what we have and park cars on it, it means that kids cannot play on it. Once it's paved and the cars are parking, it's gone forever," she said.

Mager urged the board of education to work with the village to find a solution to the district's need for more parking.

The board's facilities committee continues to evaluate options for the Hayes Field playing surface. Committee chair Dr. James Hudson pointed out that, with increasing enrollment, along with a significant increase in the number of athletic teams and students participating in sports, a reconfigured Hayes Field might have come about even without the flood mitigation project.

Athletic director Karen Peterson noted that, no matter what type of surface is on Hayes Field, it's one available field. "If there is a game on it, there is nothing else on it," she said. "Flexibility comes in practices and the types of games that can be on it." An artificial surface on Hayes Field would accommodate field hockey games, now played on Chambers Field, and free Chambers Field for other games or practices.

The board continues to evaluate options for the playing surface of Hayes Field and recently heard a presentation by Joseph Reilly, associate with KG&D Architects, about available synthetic turf surfaces and padding.

The Bronxville Board of Education will meet on Tuesday, December 16, at 7:00 pm in the school's multipurpose room.

Pictured here: Planners from KG&D Architects presenting a modified plan for Hayes Field.

Photo by Carol P. Bartold