UW to Construct Five New Residence Halls

January 21, 2016January 22, 2016 2369 Views Children’s Medical Center Dallas, di Domenico + Partners LLP, Lake Erie Correctional Institution, SC, Susan E. Wagner High School, university of southern california, Western U.S.

SEATTLE — Two 1960s-era dorms on the northeast side of the University of Washington’s (UW) Seattle campus will soon be demolished, and five new residence halls will be built in their place.

The first phase of the project will begin next month when McCarty Hall is torn down, reported The Seattle Times. The dorm has been vacant since last fall, and will eventually be replaced by three new residence halls, scheduled to open in fall 2018. This first phase of the project will cost $240 million and will be financed through bond sales, which will be paid through student-housing fees.

The project’s second phase, which has yet to be approved by the UW Board of Regents, will cost an estimated $140 million, according to The Seattle Times. It will include the demolition of Haggett Hall and construction of two new residence halls. After the completion of these two halls and the three being constructed as part of the first phase, the north end of campus will eventually be able to house 2,870 students. That’s roughly 400 more beds than McCarty and Haggett Halls offered before McCarty Hall closed.

The new residence halls will feature a variety of room sizes and designs to offer different room rates to students. They will include rooms to fit three and four students as well as double rooms with private bathrooms, which are more expensive, according to UW’s project overview. One of the two residence halls to replace McCarty Hall will include a new dining facility and catering kitchen, which will support the north campus area. A new catering kitchen in the second resident hall will serve the entire campus.

Following an analysis of both McCarty and Haggett Halls, it was determined that renovations would have been more expensive than replacing the two with the five new halls as they would need to be retrofitted to meet seismic, energy, infrastructure and current high-rise code requirements, according to UW’s project overview.

Another residence hall, McMahon Hall, also located on the north end of campus, is being evaluated as well. Depending on the evaluation, the structure could be remodeled, converted to an academic building or demolished to make room for another facility.