Athletic Complex on Observatory Hill Approaches Completion After Struggle

Radcliffe's $2.5 million Observatory Hill athletic complex--which stirred fierce community opposition for two years--will be completed in the next two weeks, and the University has apparently got what it wants at last.

But local residents say the controversy has made Harvard officials more aware of growing community opposition to Harvard expansion.

John Riseman, an Observatory Hill resident, said yesterday the residents' threat in spring 1978 to campaign among University alumni to give money only for scholarships and education and not for property development caught Harvard's attention.

"I think we hit on a very vulnerable issue," Riseman said. "If the gym was the price the city paid and the city has a say in what can be built: where, I think it's a small price to pay," he added. "Harvard as an institution has a right to grow, but Harvard can be built up instead of out."

"It's not something I drive by and say, 'Oh, look at those lovely tennis courts,'" Observatory Hill resident Joseph Inglefinger said yesterday. "Suddenly your whole view from your house has changed."

"I regret that it happened," City Councilor David Wylie, an early opponent of the Observatory Hill construction, said yesterday.

In the spring of 1978, Wylie introduced a resolution asking Harvard to re-evaluate its 1974 long-range building plans and requested a written agreement from the University to suspend any new construction for nine months. The resolution passed but Harvard refused to sign an agreement, so construction began last October.

The controversy began in the spring of 1977, when Observatory Hill residents learned of Radcliffe's plans to apply for a building permit. Many residents at the time contended that Harvard construction would disrupt the neighborhoods with congestion and change the city's landscape.

A later meeting between the city's planning board and Harvard planners to limit the construction's effect on residential areas proved fruitless. "They were very disappointed that nothing came of it," Wylie added. Former Mayor Alfred E. Velluci declared "a state of emergency" in response to Radcliffe's building plans and to Harvard's long-range proposal for more Observatory Hill construction.

The council came close to stopping the complex's construction in spring 1978 when a resolution requiring a moratorium on Harvard construction failed to get the necessary six votes from the council members.

"People then were more upset at Harvard-Radcliffe doing what the hell they pleased than with any construction confusion. It wasn't a town-gown issue," Riseman said.

Burton I. Wolfman, administrative dean of Radcliffe, who oversaw the gym's construction, could not be reached yesterday for comment.

Neighborhood residents joined forces in groups like the Neighborhood Nine Association and the Mid-Cambridge Neighborhood Association. Although the two groups began fighting for the same issue, they split up in a dispute as to whether the residents should push for an end to all Harvard construction or just the Observatory Hill complex.

Today, much of the anger and frustration has disappeared among some residents.

"I think Radcliffe should have a gym I'm just sorry it doesn't have a swimming pool," said one resident yesterday.