The next time students gather to scream their lungs out in the student section, they will have more than 5,000 new fans screaming back at them from the newly completed South End Zone of Tiger Stadium.
Over the course of the semester, efficiency and fair weather kept the Tiger Stadium construction on schedule for its completion set for the opening of the fall 2014 football season, said Senior Athletic Director Eddie Nunez.
“We are excited with the progress,” Nunez said. “Everything is always dependent on weather, and anything can happen that is out of our hands.”
Even with this football season coming to an end, the construction will continue at about the same pace, Nunez said.
“They are working several shifts which has given use the opportunity to be where we are today,” Nunez said.
He said the contractors were effective in preparing for game days on Fridays at the site, and they were back at work on Sundays.
“After the first couple of games, it really became limited how much work they had to stop to prepare for the games,” Nunez said.
Nunez said at this stage of the construction, workers are pouring a lot more concrete and making significant progress with closing in the building.
“You will see it really coming to life over the next three to four months,” Nunez said.
In addition to the approximately 1,500 general public seats that will be added by the South End Zone expansion, there will also be 3,000 club seats and 60 suites.
For safety purposes, the portion of South Stadium Drive that runs from South Campus Drive to West Stadium Road and in front of the Office Parking and Transportation Services will remain closed for the majority of the South End Zone construction project.
“Our contractors have been very diligent to make sure that at any openings into the main streets there are enough personnel to prohibit anyone from entering the construction site,” Nunez said.
Nunez said any opportunity to enter the construction area is pushed as far away from any of the actual work being done as possible.
The safety precautions taken by the contracting company is something he hopes to see implemented in many other projects, Nunez said.