OSU-Cascades has unveiled three
design options for the 56-acre site chosen for its expansion to a 4-year
campus, while engineers continue to investigate soil and other issues at the
former pumice mine on Bend’s west side.
At community meetings Dec. 12 and 13, design consultants
for the college presented two scenarios that would take advantage of the
existing excavation and a third requiring extensive fill material.
The university has said it plans to break ground in July
of 2014 for construction of a “living-learning” center of about 146,000 square
feet on a 10-acre parcel along the east side of the site near the Century Drive
and Mt. Washington Drive. The Phase 1 facility would be open for the Fall 2015
academic year.
The Phase 2 plan would involve design and buildout of the
additional 46 acre property bordered on the west by Mt. Washington Drive across
from Broken Top golf community. University officials say Phase 2 will include continued
community outreach over a two-year period, already underway, before
construction begins.
The three master plans presented at the recent community
meetings were identified as Terrace, Rim and Canyon options.
With the Terrace Plan, the existing excavation on the
site would be extensively filled, which design planners said would be more
conducive to a commercial setting than an academic campus.
Of the other two approaches, planners said the Rim plan
would have academic and administrative buildings set along the north rim of the
excavation to provide optimal southern exposure. Most buildings would be along
the bottom of the excavation in the Canyon option.
In all options, campus residences would be on the east
and west sides of the site. Long-term plans would be to have parking on the
north side, possibly on land owned by Deschutes County on the south side of
Simpson Avenue that is a former landfill.
(refer to previous posts from archive list at right)
