Campus Construction Update, August 16, 2024

Associate Vice Chancellor of Facilities Management Nick Katers and Vice Provost of Academic Program Development and Strategic Initiatives Mike McKenzie join University Communications’ Dave Blanks in studio to discuss Edwin Duncan Hall’s use as a space for art classes during the 2024-25 academic year, as well as the opening of the Holmes Drive Parking Deck, upgrades to the University Post Office and construction progress at the Appalachian 105 sports complex. New classroom spaces at App State's Hickory campus and parking changes for the Duncan Rankin/Peacock lots are also highlighted, along with the start of construction for the Peacock Hall addition project.

 

 

 

TRANSCRIPT

 

Dave

Hey, folks, how's it going? I'm Dave Blanks from University Communications. Back with another campus construction update. I'm joined in the studio today by associate vice chancellor of facilities management, Mr. Nick Katers and vice provost of academic program development and strategic Initiatives Dr. Mike McKenzie. Today, it's a discussion of what to expect when you're returning to campus. Hello guys. Thanks for coming in.

 

Nick Katers 

Hey.

 

Mike McKenzie 

Yeah, thanks for having me.

 

Dave

Yeah, we appreciate it. You guys are regulars, I love it. I'm glad. I'm glad. You have great information. Nick, I guess we'll start out with you. Can you give us a little bit of a summary of everything that's gone on over the summer? As it has been a lot.

Nick Katers 

It has been a lot. This is one of the busiest summers we've had. First off, the Holmes parking deck is open. 600 more parking spaces, for the university to be able to use. Also, the post office renovation is complete and that's going to be a fantastic new technology upgrade there. So you won't have to go up to the counter.

 

Nick Katers 

You'll be able to go in and swipe in with your card. A locker will appear and you'll be able to go and take your stuff out of the locker for that day. So it's a completely automated post office. Nobody will have set boxes anymore. There'll be dynamic reassignment of boxes, and that's, that's really kind of a fascinating upgraded way to do mail.

 

Nick Katers 

Also, we've been very successful with the weather this summer. So the App 105 Sports Complex is hitting a milestone this summer, too. We've finished the outdoor tennis courts, we're finishing up the women's softball. And we also have the auxiliary building finished up. That just leaves one more phase to go and that's the indoor tennis facility.

 

Nick Katers 

Down at Hickory, we have three new classrooms coming online for this fall semester, all on the second floor. It's the beginning of the second floor renovation. Three new classrooms will include a laboratory space, a general computer science lab and a cybersecurity lab. So all of those happened over the summer. Also, we're really close on a couple of new traffic lights, and I'll talk traffic at the end here for what the construction impact is.

 

Nick Katers 

But we're going to get a new traffic light at Hill Street to accommodate people crossing River Street from the new parking deck. Then the traffic light will be reinstalled out at App 105 to allow kids to get in and out of that giant parking lot a lot easier. And then the biggest accomplishment, I think, over the summer, was getting all of the functions that were still in Wey Hall, out of Wey Hall and redistributed to the other positions on campus.

 

Nick Katers 

I’ll let Mike talk about where they went.

 

Dave

Yeah! Please, Mike, share with us. I mean, I've been keeping my eye on the Octagon as I've been walking past, and I know that's a part of it.

 

Mike McKenzie 

Right, Yeah. So, Dave, if you remember, we talked previously about Wey Hall, just how it was unique in that that whole ground floor were not spaces that were really replicated anywhere on campus. It wasn't just as simple as, hey, this place needs a classroom. I can find you a classroom. These were places that very unique artistic skills and machinery that were needed that we just had to find completely new homes for.

 

Mike McKenzie 

And so, yeah, to Nick's point, over the summer, a lot of that is moving into the Octagon portion of Duncan. The other portion of Duncan is still undergoing construction, but we have been able to fit most things that were in Wey Hall into the Octagon. But if I give you a quick rundown just for students who are taking... whether they're art majors or are taking, you know, some of their gen ed requirements in that area, so they'll know where to go.

 

Mike McKenzie 

We are still using East Hall some. So students who are in the DigiLab, which is like the laser cutting lab or the alternative processes lab for photography, will still be on level one of East Hall. Level two of East Hall will still have art education, the book arts. fibers and some of our design studios, painting studios and senior studios workshops.

 

Mike McKenzie 

Also in East Hall, we have our synergy lab and some paper making type skills. Now what we have completely moved into Duncan is our clay studios. So if you remember the Octagon, it's kind of divided into four really big separate units. And so each of these areas will have their own unit over there. So Clay Studios will be one fourth of the octagon.

 

Mike McKenzie 

The foundations to woodshop will be another fourth of the octagon. The printmaking studios will be a fourth. And then the final fourth is like the senior studio workspaces. So when they do their presentations, when they do their shows and things like that, we have a space for them there. The one thing we did move over, actually, into Katherine Harper Hall, which already is a fine and applied arts building, but that's more the applied design and STBE (Sustainable Technology and the Built Environment) sustainable development type classrooms...

 

Mike McKenzie 

We have metal smithing and sculpture over there. Without getting too far into the weeds, they just have some very specific airflow and gas demands. And there actually was a classroom in Harper that had previously been built that was being used by STBE, that had this already in existence. And so STBE was very gracious to say, hey, it doesn't make sense for you to build out a whole new classroom just to accommodate this for a year.

 

Dave

And I will mention for our listeners, STBE: Sustainable Technology and the Built Environment.

 

Mike McKenzie 

Right. And as Nick mentioned, this has been not only ongoing all summer, but at the end of the spring semester, we did a hardhat walkthrough with the faculty, and we really gave them a blank slate. We said, hey, tell us what makes the most sense to you. You know, we don't want to pretend to understand their discipline better than they do.

 

Mike McKenzie 

And they went right in there and got to work and said, oh, this should be here. This should be here. And we actually did another hardhat walkthrough a week ago with not only the entire faculty who will be teaching in the Octagon, but the department chair and the dean as well. The collaboration that was involved, the faculty, Nick's folks, and other academic affairs will really make it a great year as we have our art programs, mainly in the Edwin Duncan Octagon until Wey Hall opens up probably next fall, where, you know, we'll have that brand new showcase for them.

 

Dave

Fantastic, Nick, and we'll go back to you on this. With all these changes, you still have to have pedestrians moving through the area. Can you speak to the disruption?

 

Nick Katers 

Sure. Thanks, Dave. And again, there's a lot going on and progress sometimes causes us to kick up a little dust and have to close off areas. I'll sort of start with some of the easier ones. First Wey Hall is completely closed now, but you can get around Wey Hall on both sides, so you can get around it through the wide walk area that runs from the parking deck area.

 

Nick Katers 

And you can also get around it on the hillside where the students entered last year, so you can get through from the West Campus residence hall area to the Schaefer Center, still on two different paths. So while there's a fenced off area, it's still passable. The central dining roof is still in process, so there will be vehicles around the central dining hall for about another 2 to 3 weeks.

 

Nick Katers 

But both entrances to the central dining hall will still be open, so that shouldn't be a major disruption, and we're hoping to wrap that up in a couple of weeks. The Duncan Peacock Complex is probably our biggest disruption, so fences have now gone up on both projects. Duncan is completely fenced off. You can get to the parking area that runs closest to River Street and get through both tunnels, and be able to traverse towards the Peacock parking lot and to the Rankin Science Complex.

 

Nick Katers 

But you won't be able to go through the old courtyard for now. While that's open. Most of the Peacock parking lot is still open. We had to reconfigure that lot to move the Appalcart bus stop a little closer to River Street, so you'll see a new traffic pattern for the bus that goes there.

 

Nick Katers 

Between Duncan and Peacock there is going to be one pedestrian lane that you can still pass through, and that will remain open during the duration of the construction. And then Peacock, as most people can probably see, the patio has been all torn up already.

 

Dave

I did see that.

 

Nick Katers 

So, that's quite a dramatic change. For a couple more weeks. You'll still be able to use that entrance up against the wall where the patio was, but soon we'll be shifting the entrance to Peacock, primarily to Howard Street, so the Howard Street entrance will become the main entrance for Peacock during the duration of the addition onto Peacock.

 

Nick Katers 

And I think it's worth saying that Peacock is going to remain about 85% open during the construction. The construction is an addition, so we're not actually demolishing any spaces that are active. So again, we'll be moving some ADA spaces up to Howard Street so that students can park and be able to enter on the second level of Peacock, the students that need that access, because we had to remove some of our ADA spots from the area of construction, there will be some minor disruptions as we periodically have to shut things down and open them back up again, but in the long run, we're going to get incredible new additions to the facilities.

 

Mike McKenzie 

Absolutely. Yeah. And on an academic front, Peacock, it's an addition. So really the main thing some students may notice as far as differences in Peacock, other than the entrance, as Nick has mentioned, is some of the faculty offices have had to be relocated down to the first floor where RIEEE previously had been. What they may see is just a couple of their faculty are in a different office space.

 

Mike McKenzie 

That's really the biggest difference from the student experience when it comes to Peacock.

 

Dave

The addition looks great. I'm just checking online at appstate.edu/future. And yeah, it's an exciting change to Peacock and I understand it extends the life of the building, something like 50 years is what we're saying.

 

Nick Katers 

Yeah, exactly. It'll make it our third largest campus building as well, which is perfect for a growing college like the College of Business.

 

Dave

And I'm noticing in this picture that there is still a traffic circle there, which is like, hey, meet me at the traffic circle. You know, people know what you're talking about when you say that. So right now, as you said, Nick, the traffic circle has kind of moved forward. Is that going to be the permanent location of the traffic circle? Will it be...I don't know.

 

Nick Katers 

So it's going to be a temporary location for a couple of years. If you recall, we still have an end goal of trying to reopen that creek.

 

Dave

Right. The daylighting.

 

Nick Katers 

Yeah. The daylighting of the Boone Creek. So when that happens, we'll move the Appalcart turnaround across the street to a different location, and then we'll end up putting in another parking deck either adjacent to Peacock or very near Peacock. But again, we still have that goal of opening up the Boone Creek, daylighting that whole area and turning it back into a natural area.

 

Nick Katers 

So I would hesitate to say that that's a permanent change for Appalcart. It's probably a 5 to 7 year change for Appalcart.

 

Dave

Okay, gotcha. So then there will...you're saying there would be a turnaround on the other side of River Street? All right. But that's a little ways down the line right now. This picture that I'm looking at says for discussion purposes only. So we are discussing it.

 

Nick Katers 

The last thing I'd like to cover is just the progress on the innovation campus. So we continue to move forward with those three projects up there, which include the new faculty staff housing, another academic building and then a district energy system to supply renewable clean energy for that entire district up there. The energy system and the faculty staff housing are going to be completed by next fall.

 

Nick Katers 

And we're excited to be able to add that to our inventory.

 

Dave

Absolutely. Yeah, it looks great up there. And Mike did you want to add something?

Mike McKenzie 

Yeah, I would just say, kind of as we wrap up, Dave, just in closing to thank not only our students and staff and faculty and everyone who's working through this process with us, and then thank our state elected officials and board of governors for continuing to support Appalachian. I mean, these are investments in Appalachian. This is a time to celebrate. While the dust is being kicked up a little bit,

 

Mike McKenzie 

As Nick mentioned, the final product, the Peacock edition, the parking deck, you know, the Wey Hall finished product...all of these are going to benefit students moving forward for, you know, as you mentioned, like the next 50 years with Peacock. I think this is a really, really exciting time for App and I think we should just pause for one second and just recognize while the dust is here right now, the end product is really going to be something that benefits Appalachian for decades to come.

 

Dave

Absolutely. Nick Katers, Dr. Mike McKenzie, thank you both so much for coming by today... for being here.

 

Mike McKenzie 

Thank you Dave.