John Saccenti

By: centraljersey.com
Princeton University is moving ahead on plans for new graduate housing.
The university announced last week that it has selected American Campus Communities to assist with preparations associated with the redevelopment of the Hibben-Magie site for graduate student housing.
The redevelopment project is intended to provide new housing units for 475 to 625 graduate students. The predevelopment phase is expected to take two years, with construction anticipated to begin in 2012. The construction period will last approximately two years, and plans call for graduate students to occupy the apartments in the summer of 2014. The project is part of the university’s Housing Master Plan, begun in 2005 to enhance housing programs for faculty, staff and graduate students, as well as the Campus Plan, begun in 2006 to guide campus development through 2016.
"The goal, really, overall, is to improve the quality and condition of graduate housing stock," said Director of Housing Andrew Kane. "A lot of the stock we offer as graduate housing was built in the ’40s, ’50s and early ’60s and is reaching the end of its useful life and doesn’t have a lot of modern conveniences."
What the new housing will include has yet to be determined, but Mr. Kane said the building will most likely meet LEED Silver standards, a goal the university sets with all of its projects, he said. The LEED building certification program encourages the adoption of "green" building and development practices.
"We haven’t officially begun the designing process yet, we’ve just been working with the developer and over the next few months we will be able to flesh out sustainable aspects of the design," said Director of Off-Housing Development John Ziegler. "The developers are all very keen on creating sustainable facilities and I think this will be a really good partnership."
Mr. Kane said the university’s goal is to house approximately 70 percent of its graduate students in university owned and operated housing. He said the new housing will include between 360 and 450 units with a variety of styles, including multi-family units and studios.
"The goal is to provide an environment to either single students who live alone, single students who want to have roommates, and we also have a fair amount of families in our graduate program, so a fair amount of children will be living there," said Mr. Kane.
The Austin, Texas-based American Campus Communities is one of the largest developers of student housing communities in the country. The company will work with the university on predevelopment tasks such as conducting focus groups with graduate students and other stakeholders, obtaining regulatory approvals, evaluating design and financing alternatives, estimating costs and scheduling services.
"After a great deal of research, including visits to a number of locations where ACC and others have developed similar complexes, we learned that there are several firms that produce very high-quality products and services," Michael McKay, vice president for facilities, said in a press release. "ACC is clearly a leader in this field, and they impressed the selection team with both projects and operations that respond to the particular housing needs of graduate students. We’re very much looking forward to partnering with them to meet the institution’s goals for this site."
Following completion of the project, the university will begin plans on redeveloping the Butler Tract, which housed 370 students last year.
"We don’t know what that development might be," said Mr. Ziegler. "The presumption is that it would probably be ready or some kind of attention, we just don’t know what that is." jsaccenti @centraljersey.com