Lynchburg College taking on 40 renovation projects

By Christa Desrets
Lynchburg News & Advance
Published: June 30, 2008

Lynchburg College officials plan to spend $2.5 million on 40 renovation projects large and small around campus this summer, including a $650,000 expansion of the school’s education building.

The summer addition of 5,000 square feet on the Thompson Education Building will serve a number of purposes, said Dave Fisher, director of the school’s physical plant.

Doubling the space in the building will provide a place for faculty offices, which in recent years had moved into on-campus houses, he said. Those houses then can be used, as intended, for student residential spaces.

“We thought we’d kill two birds with one stone, and add on to the building,” Fisher said. “It’s like putting matching bookends on the building — an addition on each side.”

The building accommodates about 675 education and nursing students every year, a combined enrollment of nearly 20 percent of the student body, according to the college.

The project began in May and is expected to finish before the start of classes in September, he said.

Fisher said 40 total projects are scheduled for the summer, at a total cost of $2.5 million. Although most summers are busy construction times, he said, the usual budget is less than half of that.

Students returning this fall will find a newly renovated bookstore and cooler dorms, Fisher said.

Earlier this week, the school completed a facelift of its bookstore in the Burton Student Center, including new carpeting, lights, paint and shelving.

The largest, and perhaps most appreciated, project is an $800,000 air conditioning addition to dormitories at Hundley Hall, Fisher said.

It’s the last remaining dorm with no air conditioning.

“They (students) scream every April and May, and all through the month of September because it’s just terribly hot up there,” he said. “Finally, that building will be a little bit more habitable.”