Some students and alumni were surprised last year when Ohio University revealed it would be demolishing and rebuilding South Green.
Now those plans are coming to fruition.
The building site where the Wolfe Street Apartments once stood — north of Ping Center between Adams Hall and Clippinger Laboratories — is being elevated to eventually hold four new residence halls, a learning commons and central office facility for Residential Housing. The construction constitutes phase one of OU’s Housing Development Plan.
The construction, a $110 million cost, will be financed with $100 million in debt and $10 million from Residential Housing reserves, according to the OU Board of Trustees Nov. 1 agenda.
OU’s fiscal year 2014 budget slated the construction’s cost at $106 million, but it was raised to $110 million after further exploring the project’s scope and infrastructure, said Christine Sheets, assistant vice president for Capital and Facility Planning.
This current construction will be completed by August 2015, while phase one of the plan is projected to be completed by 2020.
Construction has been progressing well, said Harry Wyatt, associate vice president for Facilities.
“It’s a good site (and) we’re pretty confident in the choice,” Wyatt said.
OU’s housing plan is part of OU’s larger six-year Capital Improvement Plan, which is projected to cost OU $966 million.
In the board agenda, Vice President for Finance and Administration Stephen Golding requested the board approve the plan to allow OU to “enter into a guaranteed maximum price contract.”
The rooms in the new residence halls will be suite-style, similar to Adams Hall, with two rooms sharing a bathroom, according to schematics in the board agenda.
The halls are also being built with shorter hallways and more open study spaces and lounges in what is called a “community model.”
The designs show dorms with large common areas on the ground floor and large windows throughout the building in common areas.
At this point, the designs shown in the agenda are still preliminary.
“We want to create a place you want to hang out in and study — not some closet with cinder block walls — to hopefully support what you want to do,” Ryan Lombardi, vice president for Student Affairs, said in a previous Post article.
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