Lawrence Tennis Association suffers setback in plan for court lights
On Monday the Lawrence City Commission indefinitely deferred a plan to install three new tennis courts and 50 new lights at Free State High School. The plan was the Lawrence Tennis Association's last hope to make playing tennis at night a reality.
“It doesn’t surprise me," said LTA member Bud Pettit. "I have heard some astonishing reasons for years now why this can’t happen, so I just waited for another reason to come up when we thought it was going to be done at Free State instead of Centennial. Each and every sport and non-sport in this whole town has a light system, yet we can’t play in the cool of the evening.”
For nearly four years the LTA has asked the city and the Lawrence School District to install lighting around the Centennial Tennis Courts. That plan pit neighbor against neighbor as some complained that the lighting would ruin the neighborhood. Pettit says he's unsure if the LTA has another plan in the works.
"This was the last choice that we had at this point," he said. "Having not been contacted by the Parks and Rec Department, I don’t know that they have another plan hashed out."