City Pols Show Off New Tennis Courts Built with FEMA Cash
We reported on the new tennis courts at Rye Recreation earlier in September, but on Wednesday, City of Rye officials brought a giant pair of scissors (and no tennis rackets) to officially open the four new tennis courts at the Rec. The old courts were damaged in the Ida storm before undergoing renovations with $700,000 in FEMA funds and some elbow grease from our local DPW staff.
“We are here to celebrate the opening of these beautiful tennis courts and our new, equally beautiful parking lot number one,” said Mayor Josh Cohn, also making reference to the parking lot renovation in downtown Rye. “Now each of these projects was really forced on us, [the] tennis court rehabilitation by Ida and the parking lot renewal by our efforts to settle to Save the Sound lawsuit – that is a so called environmental benefit project. So you could look at each of these things… forced on us as lemons. We had to do them, but city staff changed them into lemonade.”
The renovation includes the construction of four new hard courts, installation of LED lighting, bleacher seating, new fencing around courts 5 and 6, and new stone dust walkways. Over 100 trees and shrubs have been planted, with a pollinator garden still to be added. Courts 1 and 2 have been converted into dedicated pickleball courts. As part of the project, enhanced drainage and soil stabilization measures were implemented. All work, except for court paving and painting, was completed by the City’s DPW staff.
Watch the ribbon cutting:
