By Stephen Barnett

FOUNDATION (Ashley Keller)

By Stephen Barnett

The time is coming when the students, faculty and community around Riverside Community College will be able to reap the benefits of their patient waiting.

Robert Gurrola, the director of Facilities, Planning and Projects promised Wheelock Stadium will be ready for graduation this June. The parking structure will be complete by November 2006.

What is currently being seen is a multi stage project. Despite a 22 day construction setback due to rain, the track and field will be the first to be completed this June.

Students and their families attending graduation will have the benefits of a new lighting system and new bleachers on the visiting side of the field.

“We’ve been working overtime and on weekends to compensate for the delays caused by the rain,” Gurrola said.

The new all weather rubber track will have two extra running lanes, which will bring it to regulation size.

Also with the track elevated three feet the problem of a flooded track during the rainy season will be a thing of the past.

The completion of the football field in June will bring a sigh of relief to the RCC football team, which will no longer have its practices at Central Middle School.

“The field we are currently using sucks, but were athletes and we learn to deal with it,” Anthony Stith, a football player at RCC said.

They will come home to a new synthetic grass playing field and a renovated practice field, which they will share with the Track & Field’s throwers.

Students can expect further progress on what they’ve been demanding for years, additional parking.

To this end RCC is building a $20 million parking structure, which will include 1,100 new parking places, and eight tennis courts on the roof. This July the retaining walls will be built. However, students will have to wait until the fall of 2006 for this massive project to be completed.