Two years ago, Dr. Rex Horne, president of Ouachita, invited architect Burt Taggart to campus to give suggestions about what could be improved.
“Two things the architect recognized right off,” said Brett Powell, vice president for administrative services, “were that there isn’t an entry drive to Ouachita’s campus to define where the campus starts, and that we needed housing.”
After 18 months of planning and preparation, construction launched in early June. Currently, the contractor company VCC of Little Rock is doing utility work on the first two buildings.
The location selected for the new housing buildings presented a challenge at the initial stages of construction. Most of the underground utilities for that part of the campus ran either under the Sturgis parking lot or what was the Daniel lawn. Water and sewer lines had to be moved and the electric and fiber optic cables re-routed.
“We didn’t have any choice,” Powell said. “We told the architects to keep the existing housing during construction so we could have all the utilities running for Daniel, Ernest-Bailey and Conger.”
Though the construction may be burdensome to students, some, like freshman Rudy Jones, were not around to live on a construction free campus.
“I don’t know any other way,” Jones said.
Jones remains positive about the situation.
“For a while they were doing some drilling and the beeping noise was annoying,” he said. “It wasn’t too bad. I could sleep through it.”
Upon completion, both residential halls will be the most energy efficient buildings on campus.
“Throughout the negotiations for the construction costs we told the contractors the only thing off limits is energy efficiency,” Powell said.
Some of the new green features incorporated into the new residential halls include fluorescent lights, water-saving shower heads and efficient heating and air systems.
Regarding the structure of the new facilities, Powell said they are “intended to be more residential, more like a house or apartments. So no more concrete block walls.”
Ouachita issued bonds last spring to cover expenses to finance the project.
“We have done extensive planning to make sure that we can cover those costs without big tuition increases,” Powell said. “Also we wanted to make sure we can do salary increases and everything can still be paid for. We feel good about the finances.”
The first two residential buildings are scheduled to be finished by December 2009 according to the contract. The buildings may be ready early enough for students to move in for fall 2009.
