Students used to relying on the Old Tuck Drive shortcut to arrive at class on time will have to find an alternate route, as construction on a new residential dormitory begins Tuesday. Old Tuck Drive, which connects Webster Avenue and Tuck Mall, will be permanently replaced by the new 160-bed dorm slated to open in Fall 2006.
The new dorm, which has yet to be named, will consist of mixed housing, a combination of singles, two-room doubles and several four and five-person suites, according to Dean of Residential Life Martin Redman.
The creation of the new residential hall will permanently eliminate vehicular through-traffic and approximately 25 parking spots along Old Tuck Drive. Redman estimated that faculty and staff utilized most of the parking spots, but parking at Zeta Psi fraternity will also be affected.
Increased parking in Dewey Field parking lot will compensate for the loss of parking spaces. The parking lot behind Butterfield and Russell Sage residential halls will also remain open.
Pedestrian traffic will be affected to a lesser degree. Although the construction will keep pedestrians from walking along Old Tuck Drive, a new, permanent walkway skirting the western edge of Butterfield will connect Tuck Mall and Webster Avenue.
For safety reasons, work will begin with the erection of a fence around the construction site, Redman said.
"The first part of the project is to secure the site. We don't want someone falling in a 16-foot hole," he said.
During the first week, the contractor will begin mobilizing operations and bringing equipment to the site, according to a BlitzMail message sent out to Tuck Mall residents.
For the most part, residents of Butterfield, a residential hall bordering the construction site, seemed uninterested in the project. Melissa Henley '05 said she didn't pay much attention to news about the construction and disregarded any e-mail she might have received concerning the project.
"For all I know, they could've made an effort [to tell us about the construction]," Henley said.
Other Butterfield residents were somewhat concerned. "If it gets loud, it'll be annoying. It's one of those things that you just have to wait and see," Jason Lee '05 said.
Regardless of what they thought about the construction itself, most students supported the sentiment behind the project.
The Old Tuck Drive residential hall construction is a continuation of the College's expansion efforts, which include the construction of another residential cluster in the Maynard Street parking lot, an addition to the Thayer Engineering School at the end of Tuck Mall and Kemeny Mathematics building.
"I think it's good that they're building more dorms, that they're going to get people off the housing waitlists," Henley said.
