Campus Under Construction

By Hunter Maybee
Western Herald

Western Michigan University has been upgrading campus recently. Just look around to see the changes down to the smallest detail like newly painted roads and the cleaning of the rain stains off of Miller Auditorium.
But the biggest projects in WMU’s future center around three areas; the Bernhard Center, the Residence Halls and Sangren Hall.
Diane Anderson, vice president of student affairs, puts Sangren above the rest.
“Right now, Sangren Hall is WMU’s highest priority in terms of construction,” Anderson said.
However, Anderson said there is still debate going on about the construction process.
“We still are trying to decide whether to re-model Sangren in one phase or two,” she said. “If we just do it all at once we will run into the problem of finding enough classrooms but we will have it finished much faster. In two phases it will take longer, but we can still keep part of the building open.”
David Dakin, director of campus facility development, said however, that the work will go on in two phases.
“Phase one will most likely be the front section, closest to the road,” Dakin said. “If we get the funds we need, we will have about 12-to-18 months for planning of the remodeling. After that, if we go from phase one right into phase two without stopping, we will be looking at two years of construction.”
Lowell Rinker, WMU’s vice president for business and finance and treasurer of the WMU Board of Trustees, agreed that a two-phase approach was best.
“To be honest, if we took the whole thing [Sangren Hall] offline, we would not know what to do,” he said.
“The roof of the back part of Sangren was recently redone,” Rinker said, in reference to remodeling the front of the building first. “In all likelihood, the entire front part of Sangren will be razed to the ground.”
Dakin broke down the funds needed for the entire project.
“We have a proposal in Lansing right now,” Dakin said. “We will need $56 million for the building itself. Right now, all we are asking from the state are funds needed for phase one. We are asking for about $11.7 million from the state and WMU will contribute $3.9 million.”
“We are still in planning,” Dakin said, with regard to what changes will happen to Sangren. “A preliminary request from the office of the Registrar wants to have two of Sangren’s four auditoriums replaced with classrooms.”
The plans for Sangren also gave rise to one of the oddities of the WMU campus, the tables on the blacktop in front of Sangren Hall.
Anderson said the blacktop area will be used as the staging area for construction crews involved in the Sangren renovation.
Rinker also added, “We didn’t want to leave an employee parking lot there then suddenly take it away,” he said. “It was most cost effective to put pieces there that can be used again later, like the bike racks and picnic tables.”
“That area is going to be green space, but we didn’t see any point in turning it into green space when it is all going to be torn up again anyways,” Rinker said.
Sangren Hall was built in 1964 in honor of Paul V. Sangren, WMU’s second president.
Another big project in the works is the Bernhard Center.
“Bernhard will be a challenge,” said Ted Petropoulos, director of the Bernhard Center. “The problem is that we can’t move everything at once.”
Anderson said the university will have to remodel Bernhard in phases because it is a multi-purpose facility.
“Recently members of our administration have been traveling around the nation looking at other universities student centers,” Anderson said. “These trips will help us understand what we want the Bernhard Center to become.”
Dakin gave a timeline for the construction of Bernhard.
“We are going to be having a series of discussions in the early fall,” he said. “If all goes well, we could start construction by January.”
Petropoulos also commented on what some of the changes will be.
“Our highest priority is to get student services into Bernhard, mainly the WSA (Western Student Association) and GSAC (Graduate Student Advisory Committee),” Petropoulos said.
There was also a possibility of moving the Western Herald office to Bernhard Center.
However, Petropoulos said, “The Herald offices were recently remodeled and we want to get other student services in Bernhard first.”
The main problem with remodeling Bernhard will be parking, Anderson said.
Last on the administration’s list is the Residence Halls.
“We really need new apartment style residence halls,” Anderson said. “All of our residence halls are in need of upgrading. They need new furniture, new lobbies and much more.”
Anderson, however, reiterated that Sangren was the top priority on WMU’s to-do list.
Rinker agreed that new residence halls were needed.
“The newest halls were built in the 60s and the expectations from then to now have changed drastically,” he said.
Dakin however, said that WMU was still in a “feeling out stage” regarding the residence halls.
“We do have a need for more apartment style halls,” Dakin said. “The Stadium Drive apartments have a waiting list, so there is a demand.”
Dakin also said that WMU was in the process of looking for firms that could build new residence halls.
WMU has over 6,000 beds available, but President Dunn would like to see that number eventually reach around 10,000, Dakin said.
“Students that live on campus benefit from it,” he said. “They have a high retention, their GPA’s are higher and they are more often to stay on for grad school.”
Another construction project going on is the remodeling of the newly named Bobb Baseball Stadium.
“This two-phase project is completely funded by private donations to the university,” Dakin said. “We have to work around the season, so phase one will complete the new grandstands by March, then phase two will redo the field and the fence after the season is over.”
Recently completed in time for 2008’s fall semester is the remodeling of Kohrman Hall and the re-opening of Oliver Ave.
Dakin said about half of Kohrman Hall was gutted and completely rebuilt and upgraded with new classrooms.
Oliver Ave, opened last week Friday, is now much safer, Rinker said.
“Our primary concern was safety,” he said. “If you were heading up Oliver on your way to turn right towards the College of Health and Human Services, the road ran basically right through a parking lot. We had busses, cars, and pedestrians all in the same area. That couldn’t continue.”
The new road now has curbs and is much more pedestrian friendly, Rinker said.
One other construction project that has students talking are the large white columns going up on Stadium Drive.
“We’re not running that,” Rinker said. “That project is city driven. The project is geared towards downtown more than towards WMU.”
Rinker added that the columns are meant to be a gateway into Kalamazoo, much like the fountain on the other side of downtown.

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Posted by HeraldAdmin on Sep 2 2008. Filed under News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry

Cody Kimball
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