It's poor design and poor maintenance. HLG is good example. The design of that building was outdated by 1972 standards; let alone by what's considered state of the art today. Add in nearly 40 years worth of deferred maintenance and you get what you see today. It is as bad for those of us who try to teach in that building as it is for the students. I feel for the departments who have offices in HLG as they're as cramped and uncomfortable as some of the classrooms.
Other buildings on campus are as bad or worse. Somebody already mentioned Mouton. Fletcher is the worst designed academic building I've seen on any of the campuses where I was a student or in all of the years that I did campus recruiting while I was in industry. The entire Student Union complex needs to be leveled and redone as it reminds me of a poorly designed high school rather than a facility for a University w/ 17,000 students. Almost all of the buildings on campus show the adverse affects of deferred maintenance.
OTOH, there are positives. The new CMPS building was done right. It was a major change for the good for those of us who are grad students in that department after so many years in that crap-hole on the 4th floor of the Conf. Center. The add-on to the Business School was nicely done as well. Burke-Hawthorne will be a nice facility when they get it done. Hopefully we can get past the economic downturn and the poobahs and nabobs over in BR don't hose us up too bad on the budget so that the school can fix the rest of these problems.