Are most D1 tracks open for the general public to work out on ( when team isn't in practice). What are the exceptions?
Are most D1 tracks open for the general public to work out on ( when team isn't in practice). What are the exceptions?
Tracks are open places wrote:
Are most D1 tracks open for the general public to work out on ( when team isn't in practice). What are the exceptions?
Virginia Tech bars the public from using either their indoor or outdoor tracks at any time of the year.
Good question. I can tell you that Notre Dame's is closed to the public, but I'd like to know what's common as well.
Stanford's track is only closed to the public during team practice (and meets, of course).
CU's track is only open to the public for certain hours. Maybe that has changed.
Cornell's track was open to the public from 11am-1pm although it nobody was really enforced if you went at any other time so long as the teams weren't practicing.
That's not true. The outdoor track at VT is almost always unlocked (at least during the day time). I probably ran 40 workouts there this year.
I've never tried to run on the indoor track.
I was at CU and Boulder HS TRYING to find a place to run some track work and its all locked up tight. CU is open only a few hours a week! A place that is so with it and open and free has the tracks locked up! Irony anyone?
On the other hand, U Mich track and the nearby high school tracks are always open, other than for varsity practice. Princeton's track was open most of the time.
The new U Mich track complex will likely not be open to the public though...
To what extent is closing your track to public use legal even?
If it is a public university and used tax payer funds to build it, can they legally close their doors to the tax payers who built it??
news for you wrote:
To what extent is closing your track to public use legal even?
If it is a public university and used tax payer funds to build it, can they legally close their doors to the tax payers who built it??
Publicly funded does not mean publicly available. Do you think you should be able to go play a football game at any state school football stadium whenever you'd like?
As a tax payer, you also fund our military. Do you think you should be able to take a joyride in that tank you helped pay for?
I like to think that the more urban the environment, the more likely a track will be locked up.
I lived in Eugene for a summer and I could run at Hayward pretty much whenever I wanted.
Running on a track is not going to damage it. Playing on the manicured field might.
My local Univ track is more restricted than it used to be. I think it is vandalism prevention more than anything, they seem to lock it up about dark. Until then its open.
I think given the high cost and limited use tracks get they have to make them available.
I went to a well known SEC school and the track was pretty much always open there.
Sloetry in Motion wrote:
news for you wrote:To what extent is closing your track to public use legal even?
If it is a public university and used tax payer funds to build it, can they legally close their doors to the tax payers who built it??
Publicly funded does not mean publicly available. Do you think you should be able to go play a football game at any state school football stadium whenever you'd like?
As a tax payer, you also fund our military. Do you think you should be able to take a joyride in that tank you helped pay for?
I understand that publicly funded does not mean publicly available, in general. But the track scenario difers in 2 ways:
1) in a football stadium, generally many things are stored there. Therefore, just letting anyone in puts these things at a risk for stealing. Also, maintaining a football field requires a LOT of work whereas track maintenance is minimal in comparison. No one is going to run away with the surface of the track in their truck.
2) the military is very different. And honestly no one would go for a joy ride on a tank just for the fun of it in the middle of war. I think this speaks for itself.
But with a track, what is the big deal? I understand that it should be closed to the public while there are meets, or while the university team is using it. But I ran by my local track (closed to the public) just a few weeks ago at 5pm. No one was using it. The university wasn't, there was no meet, there was no other function. They just closed it off. There can't honestly be a good reason for this and it is very frustrating.
Once again, the government over-steps their bounds. They take money from the citizens and then, without good reason, forbid them from using the goods they built using the money. it is sickening.
Another interesting question is how many D1 tracks are "publicly funded". My bet is very few - money comes from donors and athletics department.
The other issue is liability.
As state funding of public universities continues to decline, schools will (and should) provide less to the general public. Less than 30% of my state university's operating budget actually comes from the state. And this percentage is only going to continue to decrease. We are essentially slowly privatizing our public schools. Given this, I don't really buy the argument that "it's taxpayer funded, so taxpayers should get to use it." The taxpayers have decided not to fund it, so I expect the university to respond accordingly.
Fail on both points.
state funding wrote:
As state funding of public universities continues to decline, schools will (and should) provide less to the general public. Less than 30% of my state university's operating budget actually comes from the state. And this percentage is only going to continue to decrease. We are essentially slowly privatizing our public schools. Given this, I don't really buy the argument that "it's taxpayer funded, so taxpayers should get to use it." The taxpayers have decided not to fund it, so I expect the university to respond accordingly.
How have taxpayers decided not to fund it?
taxpayers aren't even the ones who decide how much they pay in taxes--!
The government taxes us, and then distributes the money to the states. If the government is giving the state universities less and less, then that is an issue between the school and the state government. When did taxpayers decide to stop funding the state schools?
Sloetry in Motion wrote:
As a tax payer, you also fund our military. Do you think you should be able to take a joyride in that tank you helped pay for?
of course!
news for you wrote:
How have taxpayers decided not to fund it?
taxpayers aren't even the ones who decide how much they pay in taxes--!
The government taxes us, and then distributes the money to the states. If the government is giving the state universities less and less, then that is an issue between the school and the state government. When did taxpayers decide to stop funding the state schools?
Perhaps you're unaware that we vote the government into office?
might be wejo wrote:
I like to think that the more urban the environment, the more likely a track will be locked up.
I lived in Eugene for a summer and I could run at Hayward pretty much whenever I wanted.
Pretty much this has changed. Locked up now for what reason?, I'm not sure. From years past this was never the policy or tradition. What event or deleterious trend did the past years have that would dictate this policy? What is the practical reason for closing Hayward?
I would like to understand this as I enjoy the privilege of working out on that track as I had done for years past. Recognizing other schools reasons or attitudes might help shed light on this.