Construction on the UMass Campus

Sophie Yingling

To get from her bus stop at the Fine Arts Center to her class in Machmer, it used to take UMass senior Kellie Mirtle a mere five minutes, she said. But due to the construction of the New Academic Classroom Building (NACB,) between the Campus Pond and North Pleasant Street, she often finds herself late for class.

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            “At the beginning of the semester it took me longer to decide a successful route to Machmer than it did to commute to campus from way down Main Street,” Mirtle said.

The NACB is currently expected to open in 2014, and will be situated between the Fine Arts Center and the Hasbrouck Hall. The space is planned to become the new home for academic departments including Communications, Journalism, Linguistics, and Film Studies.

            “The new building will transform the undergraduate learning experience at UMass,” the UMass construction website says, adding that it is planned to create room for over 2,000 additional seats within its four stories of classrooms.

            Some UMass students are excited about the expansion of the university’s academic space, and would argue that even if they don’t get the opportunity to enjoy the building during their time at UMass, they look forward to the completion of the new building and hope to visit the UMass campus with pride following their graduation.

           

            Samara Abramson is one of these students.

“I look around at all of the construction and think, ‘this is going to be so cool in ten years,’” she said, “I think we should embrace it.” Abramson’s father is an alumnus of UMass, and always tells her how proud she’ll be to see all of the changes in the future, she recalled.

            But not all students are looking at the construction on campus so excitedly.

            UMass junior Olivia Holmes has been at the university since her freshman year and has proudly showed the campus to visitors throughout her stay, she said. With the construction “covering the university,” Holmes feels less comfortable with the way her campus looks. “I think that it’s really unattractive,” Holmes said. “The construction on campus affects my attitude more than anything else. I’m almost embarrassed to show my campus off,” she added.

“I pretty much stay away from the campus center now,” Holmes said as she considered how the detours due to construction have affected her routes on campus, “I used to go there all the time.”

            “It’s also really distracting,” said senior Chelsea Goldrick, “my teachers are always complaining about how loud it is. It’s right outside the window when I have class in Machmer.” Mirtle laughed and agreed with Goldrick. “It is so loud,” she said, “I always wonder what they’re doing out there.”

            Besides the NACB, UMass is in the midst of several other construction projects. These include the building of the Commonwealth Honors College’s new residential area, the Life Science Laboratory, and the Southwest Concourse replacement.

On the UMass construction site, it says that the intention behind all of these renovations and new creations is to remain competitive in terms of seeking out the top students and faculty. “Classroom types are planned that will encourage interactive and team learning, critical thinking, and trans-disciplinary learning and research,” it says.

But some students think that there should be a greater focus on keeping our current teachers and learners, and a less constant focus on enlarging and developing. “I think we should be focusing on the students we already have, rather than constantly trying to expand,” UMass junior Alex Schaffer said, “we should be renovating the buildings that make UMass special, not just building more.” Referring to the Fine Arts Center Schaffer said, “that’s the ugliest ‘art center’ I’ve ever seen, I’m sure art students wouldn’t mind renovating that.”

The beauty of the UMass campus isn’t just on Schaffer and Holmes’ minds, either. It seems to be a hot topic. “We pay a lot of money to come to this school,” Mirtle said, “especially being out of state. And with all of the construction it’s just not nice to look at.”

Abramson spoke briefly about the visual affect too, but unlike some of her peers, didn’t seem quite so phased by the way UMass looked. “I think I like flaws,” she began, “when I’m on campus and I look around, I don’t think about whether or not the buildings match perfectly. I think about how I am in love with UMass and how much more important that is to me than it’s appearance.”

           

            Although the appearance hasn’t reportedly bothered Goldrick either, it is the route changes that have had the greatest effect on her day-to-day life. “I was running to class recently and realized that I was basically caged in by construction and had to completely turn around and go a different way. I was so late and so mad,” she recalled.

            Each of the construction locations do offer detour suggestions on their borders, as well as on the UMass construction website. But only some students are taking advantage of those suggestions while others are creating their own new ways around campus. “I find myself traveling all the way through the campus center into the student union…way too often,” Goldrick said.

            “It just shouldn’t take that long to get to class when the buildings are so close,” Mirtle said, “but maybe it was my fault. I guess I should just take an earlier bus from now on.”