Campus prepares for new facelift

UW-River Falls is remodeling the campus once again. There is talk to redesign both the campus mall and Rodli Commons.

Interim Executive Director for Division of Administrative Services Mike Stifter provided insight on these two new remodel projects.

The campus mall project has been put into place to revamp the interior of campus. This project will run from Spruce Street, near May Hall, all the way to 6th Street, which is the Rodli area. Both projects are part of the Campus Master Plan.

The University wants to make the campus mall more aesthetically appealing. The remodel will make the mall more pedestrian friendly as far as accommodating skateboarders, bikers and people who are just walking.

Last week there was an open forum in regards to the campus mall project. There were three separate sections to this forum. There was a forum where students could bring up their ideas and thoughts, a forum for faculty and staff and a general information forum.

The Rodli remodel is a renovation project. This will take the admissions office, the financial aid office, the registrar’s office and others. Making them more accessible by putting them into one building. This was put into place so that Rodli would become the new enrollment services building.

According to the Campus Master Plan, the new enrollment services building was either going to be housed in Rodli or in Hagestad Hall.

Rodli was the choice inthe end. One drawback that Stifter mentioned of moving all of these offices to Rodli would be that all of the classrooms that are currently in that building might have to be removed.

In regards to a timeline for these projects, Stifter said they hope to be completed by 2016. By January of 2013, an architect and engineer team is anticipated to be in place. By May or June of next year, there is hope to have a formal design planned out. As for a budget for these plans, Stifter said that it is hard to say at this point.

Stifter said that redoing the campus mall and Rodli will affect students for the better. This will add to the overall experience on campus and the changes will be practical, but will have flare. The plans could affect the students time wise as far as getting across campus goes but Stifter said, “We’ll work around those kinds of things.”

Student Laura Reimann does not feel the same way. “Personally, I think it’s frustrating,” said Reimann. Reimann noticed that something on campus always seems to be changing. The projects will make it more inconvenient to get across campus.

On the other hand, Reimann also said that it would be really nice to have all of the administrative services in one building so students don’t have to go between North Hall and South Hall.