Quadlings Brace as QRAC Shuts Doors

The Quadrangle Recreational and Athletic Center (QRAC) will close at 5 p.m. tomorrow in order to begin approximately five months of renovations which will overhaul the space—and replace one of its basketball courts with a dance studio and performance space.

The closure of the QRAC in the middle of the semester, and the future elimination of a basketball court, has upset many Quad residents and prompted a flurry of e-mails on House open-lists bemoaning the loss of the Quad’s athletic space.

“People are pretty upset for obvious reasons,” said Pforzheimer House Committee President Andrew C. Stillman ’06. “But the general consensus is there is not much we can do about it.”

According to Assistant Dean of Physical Resources and Planning Nazneen P. Cooper, the space currently occupied by a basketball court will become a two-level dance space, including a 200-seat performance space on the upper level.

Lower level space will contain a practice studio, a green room, changing rooms, and costume storage.

Additionally, Cooper said that the cardiovascular exercise areas will be reconfigured and refurbished.

Signs posted around the QRAC say the building is expected to reopen on the morning of September 19.

Dancers said that they have been in need of a new space, since their current studios at the Rieman Center will be reclaimed by the Radcliffe Institute of Advanced Study later this year.

“Dancers are understandably ecstatic about the new space,” said Anna K. Weiss ’03 a non-resident tutor in Pforzheimer and a former dancer. Weiss, who lived in Pforzheimer as an undergraduate as well, served as a member of the committee set up by Dean of the College Benedict H. Gross ’71 to examine how the QRAC would be renovated.

Weiss wrote in an e-mail that the QRAC renovations will mark “a new era in the history of Harvard performing arts,” though she added that “the century of history that surrounded us as we danced in Rieman” was irreplaceable.

The decision to convert one of the basketball courts was made in September 2003 and construction was supposed to begin this past December.

But Quad House masters convinced administrators to postpone construction until spring break.

In an e-mail to the House open-list, Cabot House Master and Wolfson Professor of Jewish Studies Jay M. Harris wrote, “All quad masters were livid and fought hard to have nothing happen until spring break, which was the best we could get.”

Harris also stated in his e-mail that he had argued that a dance studio should be built without disrupting the basketball court or the rest of the QRAC.

In an interview Harris said, “It seemed to me to be a reasonable thing to do to put dance studio above the QRAC, but I guess it didn’t seem reasonable to anyone else.”

Undergraduate Council (UC) President Matthew J. Glazer ’06 wrote in an e-mail that despite student complaints, the UC had no plans to pursue any legislation on the matter.

“I’m not happy that students are being inconvenienced but I think the renovations will benefit students in the Quad. The QRAC is regularly closed during the summer anyway and renovation needs to begin so that the facilities are ready in the fall,” Glazer said.

The cardiovascular equipment will be moved to smaller House gyms and makeshift exercise rooms in the Quad while the construction is underway.

But Quad students will temporarily lose the squash courts and both basketball courts, leaving them with the option of using Hemenway Gym at Harvard Law School, the Squash facilities across in the Muir Center in Allston, or the Malkin Athletic Center (MAC) by the River Houses.

Associate Dean of Harvard College Thomas Dingman ’67 suggested that because Hemenway is already crowded, people should plan ahead.

“If people are able to schedule their work out in those moments when the building isn’t overtaxed, I think things should be OK. They should be able to find out from monitors at the front desk what the timing is, and of course there is always Muir for squash and the MAC also,” Dingman wrote in an e-mail.

But some students were not happy with that solution.

“Honestly this is ridiculous.” said Faraz Munaim ’06, Munaim, who is also a UC representative from Cabot House, plays squash regularly with his blockmates at the QRAC.

Munaim said that he is upset about now having to schedule time in advance when they are all free.

“We will have to go to Hemenway. We don’t have a choice, but won’t go everyday,” Munaim said, adding that he felt that QRAC closing was symptomatic of a larger University insensitivity to Quad residents.

—Crimson staff writer Jessica E. Schumer can be reached at schumer@fas.harvard.edu.