Rutgers-Camden looks to expand its campus

Rutgers-Camden is hoping to expand its campus, including stretching it north of the Ben Franklin Bridge, as it renovates aging buildings and creates new dorms, parking garages, a business school building, and a welcome center.

The Rutgers University board of governors approved a universitywide physical plan Thursday, including a vision for its Camden campus that includes accommodating more students and new academic programs.

"What the plan calls for now is increasing the overall footprint of the campus by about a third," said Antonio M. Calcado, Rutgers vice president for facilities. "The idea is to continue to engage the community and to grow the campus. So we want to go south, we want to go north."

The university is working on a nursing and science building south of the main campus area, pushing the school farther down a proposed "eds and meds" corridor that includes Cooper University Hospital, Cooper Medical School of Rowan University, and another building planned as a joint project between Rutgers-Camden and Rowan.

Rutgers-Camden has two other construction projects underway: an alumni house and a writers house on Cooper Street, both to be completed by this fall. And before the writers house is even complete, Rutgers-Camden is looking to expand it.

Other planned projects include a 250th Anniversary Plaza on campus, along with landscaping and signage changes.

Beyond that, the project wish list in the plan, dubbed "Rutgers 2030," would depend on a variety of factors, especially funding.

"It's funding . . . building academic programs, and working with the city as well," said Rayman Solomon, campus provost through the end of this month. "These things don't happen in a vacuum."

Rutgers-Camden has about 6,500 students and aims to increase that by 1,000 over the next five years. Eventually, administrators say, enrollment could go as high as 9,500.

The school has rolled out its first doctoral programs in recent years, and the number of graduate and undergraduate programs has increased each year.

"Most important is academic programming," Calcado said. "And facilities follow academic programming."

For the business school, administrators have long discussed - and pleaded for funding for - a 100,000-square-foot building in the northeast corner of campus, probably at Fifth and Penn Streets.

That school's offerings include undergraduate majors and professional degrees, including M.B.A. programs.

Without money for a stand-alone business school building, school officials are looking to partner with a private company with the hope that housing office space could make the project eligible to receive state tax credits.

Other new buildings on the wish list include a science research building at Third and Linden Streets, a new space at 419-21 Cooper for the Office of Civic Engagement, and a welcome and admissions center on Cooper.

About half of existing classroom and office space would be renovated if officials get their way.

Priorities for classroom renovation are 319 Cooper, 405-07 Cooper, the science building, and the fine arts building, according to the physical plan.

School officials also hope to renovate the west building of the law school, including installing an elevator.

The rapidly aging Armitage Hall, which houses financial aid and registrar's offices, would become more of a central location for student services; Rutgers-Camden would bring academic advising, career services, the office of new students, the dean of students, and veterans services into the building.

And as the number of students grows, administrators hope, more will choose to live on campus.

Rutgers-Camden has its eye on two new dorms, both at Third and Cooper, next to existing housing. That would have to be planned carefully, Solomon said, based on projected enrollment and housing numbers.

A residence hall on Cooper, opened in 2012 and originally envisioned as graduate student housing, serves both undergraduate and graduate students, after demand turned out to be lower than expected.

A spokesman for Rutgers-Camden said the school expects campus housing to be at capacity this fall for the first time since the new dorm opened.

Commuter students make up about 91 percent of the population; for that group, administrators plan to add two parking garages.

A garage for 1,200 cars at Front and Pearl Streets would extend the university's reach north of the bridge for the first time, and Rutgers-Camden would pair that garage with space for its police department and lacrosse and field hockey fields.

A second parking garage is proposed across the street from the gym. That garage would fit 450 to 500 cars and have more sports fields on its roof as well.

Source: Philly.com