The summer months brought more change and more challenges to the Center for Sciences and Innovation, the Skyline Room, residence halls and other areas of the Trinity University campus that are still under construction.
The on-campus construction focused largely on the CSI building and met with minor incidents throughout the summer.
Most notably, a piece of construction equipment was over-turned on the north side of the Cowles Life Science wing of CSI.
“A construction worker was operating a movable elevated work platform. During the move, one or more of the wheels of the equipment ran into a hole on the ground, which caused the equipment to flip over. Fortunately, the worker was wearing a safety harness that restrained him and kept him in the platform rather than being tossed out. He suffered a leg injury, expected to fully recover,” said John Greene, director of Facility Services.
Greene remained confident that this will not slow construction down, but will only “reinforce the need to be ever vigilant in our efforts to have a safe work site.”
The construction on the new science facility has necessitated closing many of the classrooms in CLS. Due to these closings, the number of available classrooms has decreased requiring that faculty offices be moved into properties that the university owns along Oakmont Court.
Also as a result of the unusable classrooms in CLS, student organizations have been asked to limit their meetings, and classroom use prior to 6 p.m. has been restricted.
However, some biology and chemistry classes and labs will be held in CSI this semester. The CLS wing of CSI is set to open for classes next fall, and the project is scheduled to conclude in the summer of 2014.
Until the construction is completed, apart from a handful of chemistry and biology classes, departments will have to be creative when reserving rooms for classes. This semester, engineering courses will meet in the William H. Bell Athletic Center and other departments may hold classes in the upper level of Coates University Center.
However, Coates is not exempt from the construction chaos. Construction on the Skyline Room, previously projected to be complete by August, is behind schedule.
“Renovation took a little longer to get rolling than we had hoped,” said David Tuttle, dean of students.
The renovations are meant to expand the uses of the space to faculty and students alike while decreasing the overall institutional mood of the room.
“We will have student weekend programming, a return of the Tuesday Happy Hour and will open the space to business affiliates for some of their business functions,” Tuttle said.
The Tigers’ Den’s beer and wine license is also scheduled to transfer to the Skyline Room. The renovations will be complete and the room will open for use this September.
The last section of renovations is occurring in the residence halls and has been minor. Major renovations of the Winn and Witt residence halls are scheduled for the summer of 2013, according to Mike Schweitzer, assistant director of landscape services. However, these improvements remain in the planning stage.
Faith Ozer • Aug 20, 2012 at 9:08 pm
Actually, he suffered a minor leg injury. He is expected to fully recover
Tanja Bartichit • Aug 20, 2012 at 2:16 am
Hopefully, no one was hurt during this accident with this construction equipment