Because it’s a college town, Brockport has two homecoming parades: one for the college and one for the high school.
So Brockport residents have the pleasure of viewing two different groups of students, competing to put on the best parade.
Most years the contest is a draw, with both parades marching through streets of the village, which are lined with people.
This year the Brockport High School Blue Devils defeated the SUNY Brockport Golden Eagles in the battle of the Homecoming Parades. It wasn’t a shutout, but it was no contest. One parade was okay, the other was great.
Friday’s high school homecoming parade in Brockport was absolutely superb. People from all over the school district came into the village just to watch the parade, and people had a great time.
The parade route for both homecoming parades was different this year, but it didn’t affect the high school parade.
Instead of getting a permit from the New York State Department of Transportation to march down Main Street, the organizers of the high school homecoming parade got approval from the Village to hold the parade on village streets.
This year the parade participants lined up on College Street. The parade route went from College Street, south on Utica Street, west on Adams Street, then south on Allen Street (past the Oliver Middle School), and through the Brockport School district campus to the High School.
The parade route was shorter, but the streets were lined with people, who parked their cars on the side streets and set up their lawn chairs in front of the Victorian houses along Utica, Adams, and Allen Streets.
There were cute little pink plastic chairs for the girls, and blue Buffalo Bills chairs for the boys, who ran up and down the sidewalks scooping up the candy that the people on the parade floats threw into the crowd.
The same wasn’t true for the SUNY Brockport Homecoming Parade just a week earlier.
The SUNY Brockport Homecoming Parade started from parking lots D and D-1 near the canal, and proceeded east on Holley Street, onto Monroe Avenue, then south on Utica Street past Hartwell Hall and the Alumni House.
But then the SUNY Brockport Homecoming Parade turned west just before the railroad bridge, so the parade participants marched up the hill to Kenyon Street with parking lot N-1 on their left and the side of Hartwell Hall to their right.
There was almost nobody on the side of the street to watch. After getting off to a good start on Holley Street and Monroe Avenue, the parade withered after it passed the Alumni House.
Who wants to watch a parade pass a parking lot?
Better luck next year SUNY Brockport. In 2013, Brockport High School won the battle of the Homecoming Parades.
