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New student recreation building opens at Shippensburg University
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Kelly Christ, in front, works out on a recumbent stationary bike in the new Student Recreation Building, which opened Monday at Shippensburg University. Barbara Phillips Long/The Sentinel
Scott Gardner, left, and Jim Farrell, both Shippensburg University freshmen, try to figure out how the Power Life weight equipment works at the new Student Recreation Building, which opened Monday. Barbara Phillips Long/The Sentinel
Shippensburg University has a new recreation center, and students put the new facility to use as soon as it opened Monday.
“I don’t like the other gym because it smells bad,” said Kelly Christ. She and Laura Holloway, who are both freshmen, pedaled stationary recumbent bikes while enjoying the view of Shippensburg’s football stadium from the cardio/strength area on the second floor of the new Student Recreation Building.
They avoided the fitness room in Heiges Field House, which had aging fitness equipment installed in a room that had once been a bowling alley.
“We couldn’t even go in there without gagging,” Holloway said.
She and Christ both enjoyed workouts when they were in high school but didn’t spend much time in the gym after they got to SU.
“We realized we were getting fat, and we decided we would take care of that issue,” Holloway said.
Nearby, two first-year men were trying to figure out how to operate an 8-foot Power Lift half rack. Jim Farrell and Scott Gardner used gym equipment in high school.
“We were waiting for it” to open, Farrell said of the new facility.
“I’ll use it a lot,” Gardner added. “It’s nice.”
Rachael Ulmer, a junior from Lancaster, was staffing the desk in the cardio/strength area. She predicted the facility would be very busy the first couple of weeks.
The old gym didn’t have as wide a range of equipment, she noted. Elliptical trainers are new to campus, although Ulmer herself prefers to use a treadmill. She is one of about 40 students who will work part time at the new facility.
The use of card-swipe equipment at the entrance is one feature Ulmer likes.
“That’s a huge difference from the old gym,” she said. Now the equipment will be used by “actual students, not random people.”
Ribbon cutting
“It’s absolutely a beautiful facility,” said SU President William Ruud during the ribbon-cutting ceremony.
Joe Peltzer, president of the Student Association, said the planning for the building had begun when he arrived as a freshman. By the time he was a junior, construction had started. Peltzer said he waited a long time to see the building become a reality.
“I love the size of the exercise room,” he said. Peltzer expects the cardio/strength area to be the most heavily used section of the building.
The 62,000-square-foot building can handle about 250 people at any one time, said Galen Piper, the director of recreation and intramurals. There are 93 separate stations in the cardio/strength training area, including a Cybex 360 functional trainer that is wheelchair-accessible. In addition, there is a walking and jogging oval above a four-court gym.
“If the machines are busy, you can walk across the hall and run,” Piper said.
The courts can be separated by curtains. All four are marked for basketball, volleyball, and tennis; one court is also marked for badminton. The hardware hasn’t arrived for the net sports yet, and there are a few other parts of the building that need minor work.
Years of planning
The television sets on top of the cardiovascular equipment will have the same cable service as the dorm rooms do as soon as the connections are completed, which Piper estimates will be within two weeks. Users can mount iPods on the equipment and people can hook earphones up.
The building passed the state Department of Labor and Industry inspection late last week, said Jody Harpster, SU’s executive vice president. He said cleaning crews spent the weekend getting rid of construction dust so the building could be opened and used Monday.
The indoor recreation center complements the outdoor recreation center, which was first proposed about 15 years ago and opened about 10 years ago.
The new indoor center has been in the works for six or seven years, Harpster estimated.
The building was completed about a year later than planned. The total cost of the new recreation center was about $18 million, said Roger Serr, acting director of student affairs.
Student fees pay for the facility. Serr has heard that some students are disappointed that the building did not open in time for them to enjoy the results of their contributions. The fee is about $137 a semester for full-time students.
Serr pointed out that the students who contributed fees toward the new building were in the same position as earlier students whose fees built Ceddia Union Building.
“While I understand that (disappointment), and there’s merit in what they’re saying, they also benefitted from what other people did for them,” Serr said.
Currently, recent alumni who feel short-changed cannot use the facility. Serr said the staff will spend the rest of the spring semester gathering data about the way the building is used. If there are times when the building could be opened to people with ties to the university, such as faculty, staff or alumni, admission policies may be changed this summer.
