While the majority of building projects will not be completed until Fall term 2006, construction across campus is on schedule. When completed, the new buildings will add 500 beds for the Office of Residential Life, provide students with state-of-the-art fitness facilities and allow the destruction of Gerry and Bradley Halls.
Two new dormitories -- the McLaughlin residential cluster and the Tuck Mall residence halls -- promise to drastically increase ORL's capacity when completed.
The additional capacity will allow ORL to renovate older dormitories, beginning with Hitchcock Hall. When these renovations are complete, the College will realize a net increase of only 125 beds, according to Adam Keller, executive vice president for finance and administration.
"When they do those renovations, they'll lose rooms," Mary Gorman, executive officer for Provost Barry Scherr, explained. "They'll lose rooms for a number of different reasons -- new stairways, elevators and new social space."
The living space provided by the new dormitories will allow the College to manage the displacement inherent in the renovation processes.
According to Keller, the buildings will also improve the quality of life for student residents.
"We're going to take some [current] beds out of commission," he said. "We're going to convert some doubles that were turned into triples back into doubles."
Keller said that this increase in on-campus housing will not have larger implications for the size of Dartmouth's student body or the quarter system.
"There are no plans to increase the student body. The idea is to accommodate the current student body and give people who are living off campus the opportunity to live on campus," Keller said. "This will have no impact on the D-Plan. We'll continue to have four quarters and sophomore summer."
The dormitory on Tuck Drive will house 162 undergraduates, while the McLaughlin cluster, under construction on Maynard Street, will house 342 students.
The new Alumni Gym, scheduled to reopen this winter, will include an improved pool, renovated fitness spaces and improved ventilation.
"There's going to be a huge expansion in student fitness facilities," Keller said.
The new pool will open ahead of the other facilities on Oct. 24, allowing the swim team to begin training.
The renovated Engineering Sciences building is expected to be completed by next spring. Thayer graduate student Dustin Wong '05 commented that even though he was inconvenienced when "they closed all the South Entrances [to Thayer], I am glad that there will be more space to work on projects, and the new facilities can only make the engineering school's reputation better."
In addition, Kemeny Hall and the Haldeman Center, soon home to the Mathematics department and Dartmouth's three interdisciplinary insittues, is slated to be completed by next summer. That facility will replace Gerry and Bradley Halls behind the Baker-Berry Library.
Fundraising for the facilities is ongoing, a part of the College's Campaign for the Dartmouth Experience.
"We're continuing fundraising. [The projects] are not all fully financed yet," Keller said.
Both Gerry and Bradley Halls are scheduled for demolition within a year of the completion of Kemeny Hall and the Haldeman Center.
"We plan to bring them down pretty soon afterward," Keller said. "That was both a condition of the construction by the town and part of the plan from the very beginning."
Tuck Drive will reopen for bikes and pedestrians when construction is completed, while the road between Webster Avenue and Tuck Drive will not reopen.
When asked about student reaction to the construction, Gorman asserted that to her knowledge few had made comments.
"We have not heard of a lot of complaints from students in that area. We appreciate everyone's patience. We know it's not a fun time if you're living close by [the construction sites]," Gorman said.
