Caroline Fassett

Senior Writer 

The innovative and luxurious South Campus Apartments that are presently under construction will be open for housing this coming fall semester. Though there will be a total of 344 beds, only 336 of them will be available for room selection by current junior and sophomore students, the rest being placed in two-bedroom apartments used for faculty, staff, and family.

Four apartment-style residential halls, each one with its own Residential Advisor, will be situated closely to one another and connected by pathways. Each building will contain laundry rooms on the second and fourth floors as well as a lounge room representative of a certain theme: a health and wellness space, a study space, a creative space, and a game room space.

Director of Housing Services Stephen Apanel shared a sneak peak of the floor plans with students on Feb. 25 at the Langone Center mall tables, and received positive feedback about the new buildings, especially regarding the size of the bedrooms, the convenience of the laundry rooms, and the implementation of elevators.

“I talked to 62 students, the majority of whom were seniors, [and] they were very excited about this. A lot of them are aiming and hoping to get one of these apartments,” Apanel said.

Even juniors who do not intend to live in the South Campus Apartments appear to be enthusiastic about the changes to come this fall.

“I’m not planning on living there next year, but yes, I am excited to have new housing on campus,” Sam Wiley ’16 said.

New volleyball and basketball courts, the latter of which will have lights so students can play past dark, will be built near the new residential halls. Apanel confirmed that the shuttle system, which will be revamped next year to both increase its stops to more areas on and off campus and to run at hours later into the night, will be extending to the South Campus Apartments.

In addition to the four apartment buildings, there will be a Commons Building featuring (among other things) a large high-tech room, two small conference rooms, a recreational area, and a small Bison-style eatery that features both indoor and outdoor seating, the latter of which will feature blue and orange Adirondack chairs.

“This building is going to be student-run, and the area around it will be like a village-type area. With the Commons Building it’s a nice complete package,” Apanel said.

Apanel said that this plan to move much of the senior class back on to campus has been an ongoing process for “quite a few years.”

“It was a goal of the Board of Trustees many, many years ago, maybe the nineties, to bring more students back to campus. We needed a place to put them for our four-year residency requirement,” Apanel said.

Apanel expressed his optimism about the success of the new buildings, which he believes may better adjust seniors to post-university lifestyles.

“To me, it’s coming together. This is a very nice, independent housing option for students. [There will be] apartment-style rooms for four people with a kitchen, and a common bathroom,” Apanel said.

“The South Campus Apartments are an exciting new option not just for the upcoming juniors, but for us underclassmen, who will be hearing about the experience and then begin to anticipate living there ourselves,” Dan Rogus ’18 said.