The College announced plans yesterday to make housing additions to the East Wheelock and Choate Clusters over the next six years that will allow the College to strengthen safety measures throughout its residential system and "decompress" a number of residence halls that are currently overcrowded.
The addition to the East Wheelock Cluster will be an 80-bed facility located between the cluster and North Park Street.
Construction on the new building -- the fourth in the cluster -- is expected to begin during Spring term 1999 and to be completed by Fall term 2000.
The rooms in the new building will be singles and doubles, and residents will become part of East Wheelock's
"Experience Dartmouth" program, according to Acting Dean of Residential Life Mary Liscinsky.
"The building won't be physically attached," Liscinsky said. "But there will be a programmatic connection."
The addition to the Choate Cluster will be a pair of connecting buildings, providing 40 beds each, joining Brown and Little Halls and Cohen and Bissell Halls. The rooms in the Choate Cluster addition will also be singles and doubles.
Construction of the Little and Brown connection is expected to begin Summer term 2000 with completion in Winter term 2001 while construction of the Cohen and Bissell connection is expected to begin Summer term 2003 with completion in Winter term 2004.
The Choate Cluster will be the site of most of the decompression, according to Liscinsky, who said decompression will take away roughly 80 beds from residence halls across campus.
"In the Choates decompression will make many of the one-room doubles into singles," Liscinsky said.
Another 80 beds will be lost due to life safety changes throughout the campus' residence halls. The beds lost as a result of decompression and life safety changes will be approximately equal to the 160 beds gained from the two construction projects.
The safety improvements will come in the form of adding stairs or exits to many dorms, according to Liscinsky, resulting in a loss of beds in those dorms.
College Architect George Hathorn said plans for the two construction projects have been developed "somewhat separately" since the fall of 1997. The College's Board of Trustees approved both plans at their June meeting, according to Hathorn.
Both projects are subject to review and approval by the Town of Hanover before construction can begin.
The two construction projects will be the last major changes to campus residence halls until a new cluster is added "probably in 10 years or so," Hathorn said.
Hathorn said no location has been picked for the future cluster, but there is a "good chance it would be located on the north end of campus in the vicinity of the old hospital."
