Double Fault?

Amherst College: Half dozen courts near the bike path destined for demolition

Okay, okay so I'm probably just being maudlin.  After all, my first brush with tennis occurred there (or the adjacent courts) in the oppressively hot summer of 1964 during a subsidized recreation program run by Jack Leaman, before he became famous at UMass.

But I'm still willing to bet most anyone who has walked or biked past these courts over the past fifty years will miss them when they're gone.  Kind of like the chain link maze at the UMass football stadium. 

Amherst College, our largest landowner, goes before the Amherst Conservation Commission next week to give notice about the demolition/conversion of the tennis courts to a -- you guessed it -- parking lot.

Since the footprint will remain the same, probably not a big environmental impact to worry about.

And the larger adjacent courts complex remains, so the fair weather grunts and thunks of balls meeting racquets will not be completely silenced.  The sounds may even carry to the bike path.

But for those of us who grew up with the fenced in fun, a little piece of paradise -- like our youth -- will be lost.

 Courts a little farther north have already been converted to a parking