Tennis courts are dangerous, embarrassment

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I was thrilled when I read in last week’s BCR that finally — finally — there was a possibility for some decent tennis courts in Princeton. Yippee! At last, I thought, we will be able to play without every other bounce hitting a seam on that awful sport court surface. Hallelujah!

Euphoria turned to speechless frustration when I read in Tuesday’s paper that the park board has rejected the high school’s wonderful plan to either fix the abysmal state of the present courts or build new courts. It has been extraordinarily difficult to sit back and watch the park board investing hundreds of thousands of dollars in countless soccer fields and an artificial lake while our poor tennis courts remain an embarrassing blot on our community.

I play tennis with people from Sterling, Peru and Ottawa. These are nice people, so they do their best not to openly laugh at our tennis courts when they find out I’m from Princeton, but it’s clearly an effort. I usually put them out of their misery and tell them it’s OK to laugh. Our tennis courts are embarrassing, I know. Opponents of the high school tennis team are not so polite. It’s high time our high school kids did not have to hang their heads when visiting teams come to Princeton.

The present surface of the tennis courts is composed of little squares all connected. At each corner of each square is a dead area that produces a bad bounce. It is virtually impossible to play a consistent or competitive game on this surface.

The worst thing, however, about our tennis courts is that they are dangerous. The surface is so slippery and slick that good footwork is out of the question. The raised bumps that exist at every seam of the little squares creates a bar to safe footwork. I was playing with a gentleman who tripped on one of those squares and fell badly. He tore his shoulder and had to have surgery which kept him out of commission for over a year. He is not a litigious person and so did not sue, but it seems to me that it’s only a matter of time before someone does so. These courts are so dangerous that I won’t let my dad set foot on them. We drive to Peru or Sterling to play. Frankly, it’s ridiculous that we should have to go out of town to find safe tennis courts.

I know that the park board has to balance the interests of many different sports, but tennis has been sorely neglected in Princeton for decades, and it’s time we did something about it.

Kelly Autrey-Webber

Princeton