For some students, The Swamp is more than the home of the Florida football team. It’s a library, a cafeteria, a classroom and a gym.
On a game day, more than 80,000 people sit and sweat in its seats. But on a weekday, students, Gainesville residents and visitors use Ben Hill Griffin Stadium as a part of their daily routine.
The stadium is open to the public every day from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m.
The stadium was first built in 1930 with a capacity of 21,769, according to GatorZone.com. It has since been renovated and expanded to fit more than 90,000 people. It was named Ben Hill Griffin Stadium at Florida Field in 1989.
Students eat lunch, study, drink Starbucks, run stadiums and hang out inside. The Florida Cicerones show prospective students and their families the stadium as part of its campus tour.
Blaire Shoor, a 20-year-old UF finance junior and vice president of programming for the Cicerones, points out people running stadiums when she’s giving a tour. She said the final stop on the Cicerones campus tour is the stadium, where potential students learn how to get tickets for UF sporting events and how to get involved in intramurals.
“We save the best for last,” she said. “It’s the part of our university that sells itself.”
Gainesville photographers use the field and stands to take graduation and engagement photos. UF professors occasionally take their students there for a class.
High school-aged athletes are among those who use the stadium as a running course.
Sophie Newman, a 19-year-old UF advertising sophomore, said there are benefits to doing stadium workouts instead of going to the gym.
“I think stadiums are a good option for people who are bored with working out or want to work out outside,” she said. “You can do just about anything in a stadium.”
On Tuesdays and Thursdays, UF freshman finance major Colin Mooney, 18, purposely gets to Yon Hall, located on the east side of the stadium, early for his technical communications class so he can sit in The Swamp before class starts.
One day while he waited, he sat in one of the chairs in the south end zone, ate his chicken sandwich from Chick-fil-A and looked out over the empty field.
“It’s peaceful,” he said. “It’s cool to see it when it’s so empty.”
Shoor said she thinks the university keeps the stadium open to the public because it’s an iconic place.
“It belongs to more than just the football team,” she said. “It’s something we can all appreciate.”
