Think bigger.
Demolish Blackham and its barns.
Demolish the Horticulture Center.
Clear the land all the way from the Dorms, to the intramural area, to the Horticulture Center area, to the corner of Johnston and Reinhardt where Blackham is now.
That is A LOT of prime land that the University is woefully misusing.
What do we put there?
State of the art student housing, enough to transform the Universirty and put an end, once and for all, to our housing problem. A Coffee house. A Gift shop. Recreational areas. The possibilities are endless.
This area would immediately become the new center of Campus life. It would bridge the gap between the athletic complex and the academic complex.
I've walked it. It takes nearly the same amount of time to walk from Blackham to Martin Hall as it does to walk from Legacy Park to Martin Hall.
This IS the answer to so many problems the University has, and for the life of me, I can't figure out why no one has thought of this in Martin Hall, or if they have, why haven't they implemented it.
I must say thats a really good idea. Blackham is past its prime and hardly serves a purpose for the university besides housing the crawfish boil for Lagniappe Day and random other minor things. Im am really interested in seeing how much the Ice Gators are going to have to do in order to make the place good enough to play at.
However, I think that any type of "new dorms" projects won't be happening in the near future since they are focusing mainly now on expanding Legacy Park.
I didn't realize there was a 'housing' problem.. with all of the apartments going up recently..ie: the one's next to drug emporium.. they must have 500 apartments in that complex.. and the new one's across from the blood center.. same...
the blackham Idea is good but, how about the eyesore parking area to the left of goodwill on johnston st. level that, plus the goodwill store, also,the eyesore used car lot next to it, the little park behind the firestation, relocate the firestation by out hit and run... ok, so now you have an entire block to play with
One, easier said than done aquiring all of these properties fronting Johnston. Two, the parking lot looked good from what I could see saturday at the scrimmage. Three, I would like to see iron fences i.e. like the ones on the intramural fields, I wish we hadn't wasted a favor for that project that we could have used on a more visible and usable project such as fencing around cajun field.
Well, the beauty of my idea is that UL already owns the land of which I speak.
That is a lot of $$$$$ and politics in acquiring the land that we don't have to deal with.
Any politics we would have to deal with be among the UL officials only.
It seems to me the only real hurdle would be money for construction. I am of the opinion that this project is so crucial to the future of UL that it should be priority #1.
Besides, this would be a HUGE revenue producer down the road with all of those students paying rent every year.
Again, I have yet to be given a reasonable excuse as to why this is not doable.
Try reason rather than excuse, please!!
I am not dissing the idea. In fact, I believe it is a reasonable idea. The only fly in the ointment was the idea to acquire private properties, or what I surmised to be private properties.
Can it be done? Perhaps, but the project will have to fight through politics. More so at the State level, rather than the University level. Monies will be another bump in the road. State funds will be difficult to attain. The State can find funds for any town/ parish festival, dog show, etc., but when it comes to funding anything pertaining to education it receives a no vote.
Again, I am not against your idea. I just think it will take some brass testes to get it planned, funded and completed.
I thought he said we already owned the property around Blackham, so there are no private properties to acquire. Is that not correct? That would be great use of valuable property that is otherwise useless. Where else can the campus expand without acquiring private property? This makes perfect sense if this university is going to grow, and grow it must.
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