As of Jan. 30, UTD has opened its new esports and gaming center, Comets LANding. As part of construction efforts, the SU Green, the grassy patch outside the SU dining area, was torn up and replaced with artificial turf, a hypoallergenic plastic grass that stays green all year round. This is part of an effort by Vice President of Student Affairs Gene Fitch to “add to the programming experiences that can happen [on the] lawn,” as he told AMP magazine in their semesterly lunch last September, showing a 3D mockup of students socializing on the lawn while a movie plays on the outdoor screen. There’s just one problem — in doing so, the university has put its entire student body’s health at risk.
Unlike natural grasses, turf retains heat. In fact, while natural grasses are typically cooler than the air temperature, turf regularly gets 20-40 degrees Fahrenheit hotter than the ambient temperature, skyrocketing as high as 70 degrees Fahrenheit higher in direct sunlight. The SU Green is not shaded, meaning it receives direct sunlight throughout most of the day, which will only be exacerbated by light reflecting onto the turf from the glass wall of Comets LANding right next to it.
This isn’t conjecture, either. In Dallas in 2015, an Allen High School student’s shoes melted during practice on turf that was later calculated to have been upward of 135 degrees Fahrenheit. Penn State’s Center for Sports Surface Research advises no sustained activity on turf of over 122 degrees Fahrenheit — a temperature the SU Green can be expected to reach regularly over the summer, given that the average temperature in Richardson between June and August is 92 degrees Fahrenheit and rising.
Dangerously high temperatures in the summer may not seem concerning at first – after all, with the university on summer break, it’s easy to assume the school becomes a ghost town. However, this doesn’t reflect reality. In 2023, 8,000 students were enrolled at UTD over the summer, not to mention that the summer is when the bulk of school tours happen, bringing thousands of young prospective students onto the grounds. Additionally, this is Texas. Eyebrow-raising high temperatures are hardly confined to the warmer months. With record-breaking temperatures seemingly every other month, the concern cannot be limited to just the university’s off season.
Is the turf of the SU Green going to hurt anybody? If I had to guess, probably not. While skin can develop third-degree burns from contact with temperatures as low as 122 degrees Fahrenheit, severe damage usually requires sustained contact, something most students will be saved from by a combination of their body’s autonomic reflexes and their own good sense.
The issue is not necessarily that the new turf is going to hurt somebody, though the possibility certainly exists. The issue is that the university is spending thousands of students’ tuition dollars on installing turf that any Comet with a sense of self-preservation will avoid for their own well-being. Yes, the natural grass the Green had previously turned an unsightly brown in the winter. Yes, it was slightly itchy to sit on for students with allergies. But that never stopped student organizations from hosting events there, never stopped companies from setting up promotions there, never stopped students from playing frisbee or catch there. This undoubtedly expensive change makes the space more hostile — the university’s mockup of students sitting on the grass is more likely to end in a trip to the Student Health Center — on the rare occasions that it is open — than any improvement to the university’s already struggling rate of student satisfaction.
In an attempt to bring the image of progress to UTD, to chase a recruitment pamphlet photo-op of green grass and smiling students, the university has instead wasted the valuable money of students on a change that actively makes a previously beloved area of campus more hostile. The decision to replace the natural grass with turf is not malicious but seemingly thoughtless, reflecting a lack of care or research put into the decisions of the university on matters of student life and campus safety. I would encourage all students investigating the new esports center to avoid the Green for their own wellbeing — especially as we enter the warmer months.
As a student body, we should be able to expect better from our administration than reckless, impulsive, costly decisions that put our wellbeing at risk, especially with so much more development on the horizon. UTD is currently constructing the second phase of the Athenaeum and the new Student Union-Student Success Center complex, with plans to build more housing north of the Residence Halls and development plans for the recently purchased land next to the Dallas International School. I certainly hope those in charge of these projects will put more thought into their design than they did into the public safety hazard they masquerade as a lawn.
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