Ashton Center rennovation enters initial phase

On the east side of IU's campus, coed undergraduate and graduate students once filled all of Ashton Center's four-story residence halls. Today, only one of the eight buildings are occupied strictly by undergraduate students. Due to the immediate need for more Residential Program and Services housing, a plan that has been in the works for the past 20 years to destroy and rebuild the center is currently undergoing phase one.\nThe IU board of trustees approved the plan to begin phase one of the Ashton Center Replacement plan. Phase one will create a physical design of the buildings and develop an estimated cost model to tear down the eight oldest concrete buildings and rebuild a 900-bed student housing facility. \nAssistant Vice President and University Architect Bob Meadows said there is no set date as to when architects in Indianapolis will complete the plan. When the design is done and the cost model is complete, the project will once again be presented to the trustees to approve the replacement plan.\nMeadows said the overall idea for the replacement plan is to modernize on-campus housing for upperclassmen and graduate students. He said there is a lot of interest from students who currently live on campus to have more "grown-up" housing.\n"The focus is towards upperclassman at this point," Meadows said. "But I do not know if they will have priority."\nHe said they are currently observing studies from campuses nationwide to decide the best layout for the facility.\nMeadows said Penn State University recently completed a 700-bed housing project only available to juniors and seniors who lived on campus their freshman and sophomore years. There is currently a waiting list of 600 students for that facility. \nThere are currently three possible layout options for the Ashton replacement plan. \nThe first possibility is to have 16 to 18 individual rooms with individual bathrooms sharing a common lounge, kitchen and study space. The second option is similar to housing at IU-Purdue University Indianapolis, which consists of two to four bedrooms grouped together that share two bathrooms and a common kitchen and living space. The third prospect is to have two rooms joined together that share a common bathroom and living space.\nOption two is the closest layout to apartment-style dorms. Meadows said they are trying to focus on a style of living on and off campus. He said they do not want to compete with apartments already on campus.\n"We are trying to understand what students want," Meadows said, "and right now they want both."\nIn addition to the student rooms, there will be six classrooms and a common lounge added to the Ashton Center. Meadows said these opportunities for students help to create community areas on campus.\nAccording to RPS, it currently costs $4,152 to live in a single room and $5,452 to live in double room. The cost of living in Ashton has the potential to increase, though not dramatically, Meadows said. \n"My understanding is that RPS knows what they can change," Meadows said. "The price has to be within that range, or else they would not build."\nAssistant Vice Chancellor of RPS Bruce Jacobs said the Ashton project should be completed within a few years. From there, a plan to renovate all dorms on campus within the next 15 to 20 years will be underway. \nJacobs said the previous reconstruction of Willkie was exceptionally successful because they were able to get a sense of what students wanted. IU-Bloomington Interim Chancellor Ken Gros Louis agreed.\n"Willkie has been such a success that clearly upperclassman prefer the kind of housing that would be in the new structure that will replace Ashton," Gros Louis said.\nStudents will continue to help aid the committees to find the perfect setup and plan for the future Ashton Center residence hall.\n"My philosophy is that the students are the key stake holders in this," Jacobs said. "I think you need a direct impact from the folks that are living there."\n-- Contact staff writer Kristin Huett at khuett@indiana.edu.