Every time I walk down Cates Avenue and turn onto Morrill Drive, I get sleepy. The lackadaisical hum of slow-moving machinery or, at times the unsettling stillness, has the power to lull anyone into a stupor.

A stupor has, apparently, engulfed the plans for renovating the former Derr Track area.

The Curtis and Jacqueline Dail Softball Stadium is still under construction. Still.

The original deadline has been pushed back several times, and the project that was originally supposed to be done before the softball season began this spring will not be finished until the fall 2007 semester.

Construction appears unhurried. Slowly but surely, progress is being made, but there is a lack of inherent motivation. There is no drive.

If the plans were for a men’s basketball arena, it would be done by now.

The seniors on the softball team — who helped begin the N.C. State softball program — will graduate this year without having a true home stadium. They will leave their legacy on the field at Walnut Creek, a 20-minute drive away from campus in downtown Raleigh.

Track and field is also at the mercy of construction as the men’s and women’s teams are forced to run on foreign surfaces, in Reynolds or on grassy fields.

There has been great anticipation within the University’s athletic community surrounding the construction of the new facilities, and rightly so. But that anticipation has not spread to the student body at-large as complications have time and again averted the finished product.

It’s a grand ideal, this new stadium and track, but why has it taken so long to build? The answer is no go-juice — passion.

As with any major project, there is the inevitable administrative red tape: the slow, tedious processes of working with a variety of people — contractors, architects, boards that must approve plans. As with any project, there will be complications and setbacks, and while the boards may finally approve the plans, Mother Nature sometimes disagrees.

But a fire needs to be lit under this project. Where does this fire start? With the administration? With students? The correct answer is all of the above. We need a vision that everyone involved — especially students — can get excited about.

Many students don’t understand the implications of the new facility. How can they if there is no apparent reason to get excited about this new possible facet of student life because the project is moving so slowly? Students look at the gradual growth of this Olympic-caliber stadium and track and think, “Well, if it were important, there would be more progress.”

The new facility is something to get excited about. Let’s move it along then. Let’s get the party started. This is like sleeping in on Christmas — we’re getting something really great this year! Why are we staying in bed?