As Ivy Tech Community College — Columbus comes closer to breaking ground on its new main campus building, the college is also considering the possibility of a side project — revamping the entrance to the Airpark campus.
Chancellor Steven Combs showed two possible landscape designs for the area. One is what is currently budgeted for the building project and will cover everything needed for the new building. The other design imagines what the campus could look like with support from Ivy Tech’s community partners.
The second design could provide features such as a “brand-new entryway into the airpark campus and a nice drive and drop-off to the CLC.”
“That would tie into our parking lot and would modify our parking lot just a little bit to give us a more grand entrance as well, if that were to come to fruition,” Combs said.
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He said that new parking is needed not just to serve the new building, but also the Columbus Learning Center, which currently uses the parking lot behind Poling Hall for event parking.
Combs also that once Poling Hall is removed, it will leave a “hole” from where the hall aligned with the Columbus Learning Center.
“The learning center and Poling Hall are kind of connected by a brick wall,” he said. “And behind that brick wall, you’ve got some infrastructure, you’ve got some trash cans. And so, when you remove Poling Hall, that becomes exposed. So we started saying, ‘What are the things that we need to think about with the CLC as we create this new building to make those buildings better align? And how do we fill that hole?’”
Combs said that the college is in early discussions with the Community Education Coalition and other partners to see if they’re interested in this endeavor.
“We’re just having some conversations with folks within our community, folks on the airpark campus, to say, ‘Here’s our dream. Here’s our desire. Are you interested in helping us see if we can make this happen?’” Combs said.
He said that it’s possible that while he doesn’t know exactly what community support might look like for this potential side project, it’s possible that community members might decide to make the new entrance a gift to the college, since doing so would benefit more than just Ivy Tech.
“One of the things the community has always been wanting to do with the airpark campus is really make it more attractive to everybody within our region, our local communities, to really think about, you know, Ivy Tech, IUPUC, Purdue Polytechnic being a first choice option, as opposed to going off somewhere,” Combs said. “And I think, through COVID-19, people are really thinking about that now.”
He said that the college will need to know by the summer of 2021 if they have the funds and support to make this side project work, especially since they could save some money by hiring the same construction company to do this additional work.
“Even if we don’t get it completed as part of our final plan, you know, it’s something we could work on over the five years,” he said.
Combs said that, for the new building, the college hopes for occupancy in the summer of 2022 and final completion in December of 2022. The building project is currently in its “design development” phase.
The college released images of possible interior and exterior designs for board members, showing common areas, hallways and meeting areas.
While the initial schematic design was $6 million over budget, Combs said that the project has been revised to reduce costs and is now “well under” $1 million in overruns.
“We’re not set on a budget yet, but we’re very close,” he said. “We hope to announce that in October. We’ll have another, larger meeting with the team to look at our guaranteed maximum price.”
Therese Copeland, executive director of resource development for the Columbus campus, said that the college plans to break ground on the new facility in late 2020 or early 2021.
While the first planning meeting for the event will take place in October, Copeland said she currently foresees the groundbreaking ceremony being a “hybrid” event, with some key individuals attending in-person and everyone else tuning in virtually.
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In February of 2020, Ivy Tech selected IwamotoScott Architecture of San Francisco to design its new main campus building in Columbus. A grant from Cummins Foundation Architecture Program will pay the architectural design fee for Ivy Tech’s new building.
The new main campus building at the Columbus AirPark will serve students in Bartholomew, Decatur, Jackson and Jennings counties. The $32 million, 79,800-square foot structure will replace the aging Poling Hall.
Combs said earlier this year that the project isn’t just a new main campus building, but actually a completely new campus for Ivy Tech — Columbus, with the new building becoming the entryway to the AirPark and to the entire Learning Center campus.
The architect of record for the project is CSO Architects, and the contractor is Pepper Construction. Both are based in Indianapolis.
More information on the building process can be viewed at the project’s website, ournewcampus.org.
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