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By TYLER RALEY | Staff Writer

CHELSEA – The Chelsea City Council received an updated design for a potential second gymnasium at Chelsea High School and presented an idea for developing a new competition tennis complex during a special called work session on Wednesday, March 5.

The council last received a design for the potential new gym and discussed its pros and cons during a pre-council meeting on June 18, while also presenting questions to Shelby County Schools Assistant Superintendent of Operations David Calhoun.

This time around, Calhoun presented a new preliminary and conceptual design, which held numerous differences to the one that was presented in June.

The first noticeable difference in comparison to the original design is the seating capacity. Calhoun mentioned that this gym will not be truly meant for the varsity level of competition in high school athletics, essentially becoming more of a secondary option for junior varsity and other lower-level teams.

“This is not a competition gym for varsity sports,” Calhoun said. “The design package from the summer had more seating and could seat about 2,000 people. This is about 998 seats, so it’s considerably smaller.”

In the design, the gym has been placed to be an extension of the southwest portion of the school near the baseball and football fields. As a result, this project would extend into the existing student parking lot. However, due to the reduced size, the new rendering only accounts for taking up around 65 or 70 parking spaces.

According to the older drawing, the project was estimated to take up 30,000 square feet of space. With the reduction in size, this new model would be set to cover 20,000 square feet overall.

The rendering showed enough space to allow two volleyball cross courts, which would run on each end of the basketball court and would have its end zones set up facing the nine rows of bleachers that would take up both sides.

In addition, the new drawing also presents larger bathroom models and a kitchen that is attached to the connecting lobby and also has windows that open up to the outside for when students or fans desire concessions during baseball and football games. On the flip side however, the drawing has taken away the multipurpose space that could be used for wrestling, cheerleading and other fall sports activities.

Calhoun discussed how, due to the possibilities that the project presents, it not only provides the high school with the ability to host more tournaments for multiple sports, but also a chance for the middle school basketball teams to make their way over to play games on a high school floor.

“The middle school gym is fine, but they struggle on game night because in the league that they’re in, there’s an expectation on a basketball night, that there’s two girls games and two boys games, and that’s a lot of people.” Calhoun said. “This would be an opportunity on a game night for the middle school to come over to the high school. They’re already doing it for football season, they already go off campus to play all their softball and baseball games in the spring, so going off campus to play their winter games would not be a huge change.”

Calhoun now awaits approval from the council to send the design off to be engineered so that the Shelby County Schools Board of Education can configure a number on how much it is willing to contribute to the project.

Chelsea High School Principal Brandon Turner expressed his appreciation for all that the project would do, not only from a performance aspect for many sports at the school, but from a scheduling standpoint as well, allowing them to not run into as many conflicts when planning out class scheduling.

“The scope of something like this, even in its current form—no it may not have all the bells and whistles that it once had, and it may not be our varsity competition, but certainly for like a ninth (grade), a JV… it would be a great facility,” Turner said. “The vast majority of the schools that we go to and that we see in our area and our region, this would be something that realy sets us apart.”

Following the presentation of the new design, Mayor Tony Picklesimer presented a design for a new competition tennis complex that would be located at the intersection of Sports Highland Parkway and Grand Slam Drive.

The current conceptual idea for the complex showcases eight tennis courts with parking spaces, a pavilion and a concession area that would serve for snack purposes only. The pavilion also includes restrooms and a storage area.

The council presented the idea at the work session with a budget estimate of $2,409,528.02, but no square footage estimate.

The council also allowed plentiful time for feedback and questions from Chelsea tennis coach Molly Coger, who appreciated the vision and feels it would be very beneficial for the future of the tennis program.