University administrators and Evanston officials gathered for their quarterly committee meeting Tuesday and discussed Northwestern’s plans to develop some of its currently unused properties.
The districts refer to NU properties that have been zoned by the city. Zone T1 encompasses the area immediately west of Sheridan Road and zone T2 comprises the majority of the east side of the road. Zone U1 is composed of the areas surrounding the residential houses along University Place west of Sheridan Road.
There are currently “no proposed demolitions of existing structures or new construction plans” for the University’s T1, T2 and U1 districts, said Ronald Nayler, NU’s associate vice president of facilities management, despite these items being listed on the committee’s agenda Tuesday night.
The committee then revisited the topic of the Roycemore property, located in zone U1. Ald. Judy Fiske (1st) asked about the University’s plans of developing the unused Roycemore property, and Nayler answered that NU still intends to use the space to build new residence halls and office space for faculty moving from Kresge Hall.
Nayler said University President Morton Schapiro wants to build more campus housing units. Although Nayler notes that there is always a desire to have more students living on campus, the cost of building a new residence hall needs to be weighed against student demand. He said despite the fact that almost all freshmen live in University housing and account for more than half of all available bed space, all upperclassmen who want to live on campus are able to do so.
Nayler also mentioned that the condemned Lincoln Avenue fraternity houses may be removed to make space for new residence halls.
“Our goal is to vacate all of those fraternities and then demolish those buildings,” he said.
However, even if the space is available, the University still needs to obtain funding for building a new residence hall before committing to concrete plans.
“It costs more to build a new residence hall than we can afford to charge students, given the quality standards we have in place and the space and amenities we provide,” Nayler said.
The committee on Tuesday also introduced the possibility of NU providing the city with space for an underground water reservoir beneath Long Field.
The city is conducting negotiations about whether to provide the other local communities with water and plans to spend the rest of the year determining whether or not to invest in a detailed study in 2013 to determine if the communities are better off being served by Evanston or Chicago.
Nayler said if Evanston is to provide water to the northwest communities, NU has the space to build a larger reservoir underneath Long Field. NU’s reservoir is currently located underneath the Lincoln Street parking lot, and will be shifted across the road if Evanston decides to sell water to neighboring communities.
However, NU is hesitant to make a decision until plans are more concrete, Nayler said.
“We want to improve Long Field with a running track and artificial turf to make it available for longer periods during the year for students and the community, but we don’t want to make that investment unless we know what’s happening with the reservoir,” he said.
Fiske and Nayler also thanked Tuesday the committee in addition to Evanston and NU community members for providing the NU Athletics Department with suggestions regarding the construction of a new tennis scoreboard for the outdoor Vandy Christie Tennis Center. The University’s amended plans include “removing the top portion of the trellis to bring the scoreboard as close as possible to the fence line at the request of neighbors,” Fiske said.
“We want to support the tennis team,” she said. “The fact is they need the scoreboard, and we should do everything that we can to make their experience at NU a positive one.”
The next committee meeting is scheduled for Dec. 2 at 7 p.m.
