HARLINGEN — New AstroTurf at two local high schools will be ready for football season.
Work on the tracks at Harlingen High School and Harlingen High School South began after Spring Break and will continue throughout the summer with expectations for fall completion.
“The track at Harlingen High School already has the concrete curbs and the asphalt pavement,” said Oscar Tapia, assistant superintendent for district operations.
“Once you put the asphalt down, there’s a 28-day curing time,” Tapia said. “You have to wait before you put the track surface on it.”
The Harlingen South project is about two weeks behind the HHS Cardinal campus.
“We started the Cardinal campus first because South still had some track events going on,” Tapia said. “We started demolition at the Cardinal (campus) and two weeks later we started at South.”
The district has already ordered the AstroTurf for the two football fields.
“There’s a delivery date sometime in July,” he said. “The site will be prepped. The whole base material and the limestone will be rolled out according to the right elevations.”
The ground limestone, he said, looks like caliche.
“It’s fresh limestone,” he said. “Once the artificial turf gets here they’ll start installing it, but it won’t happen until early July. It’ll take about two or three weeks to put down.”
He said the district expects work to be completed at both schools by the first week of August.
WHAT: Track projects
WHERE: Harlingen High School, Harlingen High School South
DATE OF COMPLETION: Early August
COST: $3.75 million in TRE funds
