Construction on Cal Poly’s campus continued over the spring break holiday, and many students hoped progress would be evident by the time school resumed today.
Elana Polan, a graphic communication senior, said before the break that she would like to see Area 52 opened up again.
“Without that walkway it’s basically impossible to get to class on time,” she said.
Area 52 also blocks a substantial area between the Erhart Agriculture and English buildings on campus. English junior Rebecka Henry said opening up that passageway would help with the human traffic gridlock on campus.
Contributing to that gridlock are bicyclists trying to navigate through campus while avoiding pedestrians and construction zones.
“They need to do something to better accommodate bicyclists,” Bond Walker graphic communication senior, said. “I always feel like I am about to get run over when I’m walking through a narrow re-route path. There are too many people and not enough space.”
Those responsible for overseeing the construction on campus, such as project manager of the Facilities Planning and Capital Projects Barbara Queen, recognize student concerns, and sympathize with student frustration.
“As much as we would like to wake up tomorrow to see all of the construction completed, it just doesn’t work like that,” Queen said.”Projects of this magnitude take time and careful planning — we can’t just wish the tedious parts away.”
Just as the construction cannot be wished away, the construction cannot be performed any faster either, said Joel Neel, senior associate director of Facilities Planning and Capital Projects.
Many people expected a tremendous amount of work to be accomplished over the spring break holiday, but that is just not feasible, Neel said.
“The timelines for these capital projects are upwards of two years long,” Neel said. “In the grand scheme of things, one week is not going to make much difference. We are just going to keep working like we have been, and take advantage of the access we have to campus with students away.”
The work done during the holiday is “pretty boring,” Neel said. The Rec Center was closed in, roofing went on and the building was made watertight. The outer shell of the Meat Processing Center was also worked on.
The progress made on the Center for Science is equally dull, Queen said. Like the other projects, the major advantage to the spring holiday is that trucks were able to transport goods easily.
“Really, over break we will be focusing on hauling cement, rocks and other materials off campus to ready the site for building,” Queen said before the break. “In this case we didn’t plan for the heavy moving to occur over break — it was dumb luck that it worked out like that. But, we’re going to take advantage of it and try to get as much done as we can.”
In the meantime, the inconveniences of campus construction will continue to be commonplace on Cal Poly’s campus. Neel, Queen and the rest of the team responsible for the projects are hopeful that students and faculty will continue to be cooperative.
“So far, everything has gone really smoothly … everyone has been accommodating and understanding,” Neel said. “We hope the projects continue to move forward in a similar way.”