If the play of the Detroit Lions doesn't improve next year, it won't be because of their beautiful new practice facility, which is set to open in March.

The Lions will have training facilities that include an indoor practice field, and two outdoor, full-size regulation fields, plus another half of a field. The $34 million project will not only include practice facilities, it will contain the administrative offices for the entire Detroit Lions operation.

"The Detroit Lions' new headquarters will be a world-class facility that is elite among professional sports teams' training centers," said Lions vice chairman Bill Ford, Jr.

White-Olson is acting as construction manager on the project, which currently employs about 110 building trades workers. Olson Project Supt. Mike Zatroch said project planners toured NFL practice facilities around the country to learn what they want and don't want in the new building.

"We took the best features from the ones we looked at and incorporated them into this facility," Zatroch said. "This has been a design-build project, and things are going very well.

The trades have been very cooperative, and the architects and the mechanical and electrical contractors have done a great job and have helped us quite a bit."

The architects are Gensler and the Smith Group. Limbach and John Miller Electric have been the prime mechanical contractors.

Set on 22.7 acres at the Southfield Freeway and Rotunda Drive, the site is dominated by the 220-foot wide, by 440-foot long, by 110-foot high indoor practice field. In addition to staff offices, the building includes a broadcast studio, a theatre to watch game films, a weight room, locker rooms, rehab facilities, a kitchen and dining area, a players' lounge, and an observation area for the indoor field. At this time, the Lions have no plans to allow the general public to view practices.

Zatroch said the Lions primarily plan to practice on the outdoor fields, in order to reduce injuries. The chalk lines on those fields can be reconfigured in order to spread out the wear and tear on the grass. The indoor practice facility will be used when the weather is inclement. Its surface, "Nexturf," will be identical to the one that will cover Ford Field.

Completion of the new training facility on the Allen Park-Dearborn border means the Lions will no longer conduct training camp at Saginaw Valley State University, as they have done the past few years.

ON ANY GIVEN Sunday next season, the Detroit Lions will be playing at their new stadium in Detroit, Ford Field. On other days, the team will be spending most of its time at their new practice facility which is under construction in Allen Park. Here Darrell (Woody) Smith of Glaziers and Glassworkers 357 and Modern Mirror works on the lift outside the indoor playing field.

Ken Reynolds of Laborers Local 1191 sweeps the playing surface.