Youth Academy Invites Residents To Grand Opening

By Kendra Bobowick

The building fits right in. Surrounded by nearly 80-year-old former state hospital buildings at Fairfield Hills, the new Newtown Youth Academy settles regally into the sloping grounds with its brick façade, white columns supporting a balcony that overhangs the entrance, and sweeping indoor playing fields. Inside this week were the sounds of power tools and workers scuffling across unfinished floors as they work to install last-minute touches before a grand opening on November 1.

“The next step is to fill it, to hear kids playing; that’s what it’s for,” said youth academy director Keith Miller. He stopped for a moment during a walk-through this week and was quiet, imagining the sounds of shouts echoing in a gymnasium, or basketballs hitting a backboard.

Do not let “youth” or “academy” mislead you, he warned. What do he and owner Peter D’Amico envision? “It’s not a school and not just kids. It’s really a community center, a gym, track, fields, fitness center ...” he said. “Ultimately we hope parents will stay while [their children’s] teams play, We’re trying to create an interactive feel.”

Residents, sports enthusiasts, and anyone with an interest in maintaining a fitness routine, for example, is welcome to their first tour of the multipurpose facility on November 1. The upcoming Saturday will see an invitation-only reception from noon to 2 pm. After 2 pm the public is encouraged to tour the two floors of mixed fitness and leisure areas, Mr. Miller said, and sports organizations are urged to try the fields in one of two roughly 30,000-square-foot rooms — one a field house, and another a turf house. Between the two is a great room where a café will serve juices, wraps, energy bars, yogurt, soups, salads, and more. Beyond the seating areas and island with barstools is a retail space.

Running his hand along an unfinished surface that will be ready to greet guests on the first day of November, Mr Miller explained this week, “We want this to become a place people want to be.”

Crossing the nearly finished ground floor, he passed a half-wall overhung with shaded lamps, and noted the semiprivacy of an eating area. The message? Relax. Across the hall from the café space he indicated a door closed on a small room with a window toward the main space. “It’s multipurpose, meeting, day care,” he said. Glancing up, he followed the exposed duct work toward the field house where men working to buff the floors this week diminished with the distance to the other side of the room. With a ceiling reaching 45 feet high at the center, teams can play while residents maintaining a walking routine circle the track along the room’s outer edges. From above are windows where men and women cycling or stepping along on a tread mill can look down on games in progress.

Will parents stay for a spin class upstairs, spend time with a personal trainer for 30 minutes, or just sip coffee on the enclosed back patio as their children play? Mr Miller hopes so. Behind the academy are saplings already turning colors with the fall, new sidewalks, and a 40-foot fountain in the making. The academy is also a place where younger children can learn athletic basics to prepare them for future sports play.

Beyond the front walkway and landscaping are the outlines of what will soon be the first part of a permanent parking area. While contractors wait for setbacks with the state in order to take down Greenwich House that now stands on top of what will be a greenway amid additional parking space, Mr Miller swept an arm outward. “That’s two lanes,” he noted, indicating one strip of bull-dozed earth. Beside it, he described the meaning of concrete curbing and leveled ground; it is the beginnings of parking. With an eye toward the sprawling academy and its 80-year-old neighbors, he said, “This will have a campus feel to it.”

Turning to again face the Newtown Youth Academy, he explained the amount of thought and planning that Mr D’Amico especially has put into the project. “We want people to come up and say, ‘Wow.’ We want them to see the quality and magnitude.” He anticipates a grand opening November 1 with a DJ, and vendors to represent the many hands involved in the youth academy.