nothin Bowen Field Ready For Elm City Bowl | New Haven Independent

Bowen Field Ready For Elm City Bowl

Aliyya Swaby Photo

Hillhouse’s marching band at Thursday’s announcement.

The long-awaited renovated Bowen Field at will be ready in time for the annual Thanksgiving Day Elm City Bowl showdown between the Wilbur Cross and Hillhouse High football teams.

A year after breaking ground on the $11.6 million renovation of the field at the Hillhouse field, city, state and district officials kept their promise to have it finished in time for the traditional game. They made the announcement Thursday morning on the grass outside of the field, which was still in the process of construction.

The project was delayed several times, hitting a snag in the summer of 2014 when the city discovered pollutants in the track and the bleachers and had to gather funds to haul them away.

As a state senator, Mayor Toni Harp worked with New Haven State Rep. Toni Walker to fast-track state funding for the field’s proposed renovation.

Now Bowen Field looks better than it has in a very long time,” Harp (pictured) said Thursday. This year, the famous clash will take place on this very spot.”

Principal Zakiyyah Baker.

Walker urged people to use the field once it has been completed: We better see families out there. We better see everybody out there.”

The renovations include replacing the grass field with turf, installing a new eight-lane track, and replacing old bleachers with new ones. The field will continue to be open to the public — meaning neighbors can soon start taking morning walks or jogs along the track, and local youth track teams can schedule their practices on a brand-new facility, said school district Chief Operating Officer Will Clark.

The field is one of the last projects in the city’s $1.7 billion school construction program, launched in 1995.

Schools Superintendent Garth Harries said the collaboration on the Bowen Field renovation showed teamwork at different levels of government and within the community around Hillhouse. A lot of things got in the way, including the weather last winter,” he said. It was not a pretty victory. There were extra innings.”

Though two high school teams will be facing off Thanksgiving Day, we’re one team in this city,” Harries said.

Cross and Hillhouse bands and cheerleading teams gave everyone a taste of the entertainment they can expect to see on the field in three weeks — each performing and dancing to applause from the crowd.

IDEA Academy Principal Fallon Daniels cheers on the band.

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