Though administrators have approved funding for a study to examine renovating Norris University Center, changes won’t be made to Norris anytime soon.
Monday’s decision to undertake a study is one of six made in response to proposals presented by the Undergraduate Budget Priorities Committee to administrators in February. The Planning and Budget Group’s decision regarding Norris fits into the university’s long-term development plan, said Vice President for Student Affairs William Banis.
The study will explore a possible total renovation of Norris’ ground level, which would entail a major structural overhaul.
“The ground floor, in my opinion, needs to be gutted and redesigned from the floor up,” Banis said.
The new layout could feature “contemporary food service venues,” Banis said.
The university will also look into remodeling Norris’ third floor to add more office space for student organizations.
“We have a master planning framework for the campus, which is kind of like an umbrella or scaffolding framework we can use then for looking at the component pieces,” Banis said. “This is the right time for us to take a very detailed look at Norris.”
The study should be completed by the end of Spring Quarter 2009, Banis said. He said working out the budget, planning the redesign and the actual construction to each take an additional year, so the renovation would not be complete until 2012 at the earliest.
The university will also begin researching what changes students want implemented during the consulting process in addition to the data they already gathered in preparation for the first floor’s renovation, Banis said. Traffic inside Norris has increased by about 1,000 people a day since Starbucks Coffee opened on the first floor in January 2007.
“We feel the ground floor looks pretty outdated, just not very visually appealing, so everything from that to providing different kinds of couches and seating, to bringing in a couple new franchises, as we saw with the Starbucks, and how that was welcomed by a lot of students,” UBPC chairman Jonathan Kent said.
The Norris renovation proposal was at the top of the group’s list this year, and this is the most successful year the committee has had, the Weinberg junior said.
SESP senior Aneesa Arshad, a UBPC member, wrote the group’s Norris proposal. Though Arshad’s proposal called for a complete renovation at an estimated cost of $6 million-$8 million, Arshad said the university’s commitment to considering changes is promising.
“One of the main reasons President Bienen said nothing has been done is he hasn’t seen a good proposal,” she said. “And so if that’s the reason, and if he realizes that something needs to be done but he just hasn’t seen a good draft of what should be done, then that’s the first step.”
