SAN MARCOS: University launching two construction projects over the summer

Plans call for meeting center, new academic building

By ANDREA MOSS - Staff Writer | Saturday, May 31, 2008 9:52 PM PDT ∞

SAN MARCOS ---- With most of their students gone for the summer, Cal State San Marcos officials are kicking off two construction projects designed to help the 18-year-old campus better handle its growing enrollment and bustling list of daily activities.

Construction workers broke ground earlier this month on a $4.75 million meeting center that has been in the works for at least three years.

Already named McMahan House, the center will provide the university with badly needed space in which to hold large meetings, major fundraisers, alumni events and other sizable gatherings.

"We have conference rooms now," said Russ Decker, director of planning, design and construction for the university, on Thursday. "But this (center) will be exclusively devoted to that."

In July, crews will begin moving dirt on another part of the campus in preparation for construction of a social and behavioral sciences building.

The structure will bring the university's psychology, sociology, communications and mass media, economics, political science, anthropology, liberal studies and human development programs together under one roof for the first time. The programs are housed in various buildings around the campus.

And later this summer, university officials will ask the Cal State's system's board of trustees to sign off on the construction of a 1,600-vehicle parking structure on the campus.

Decker said the university's building projects are not necessarily limited to summer.

"It is nicer to do it with less people around," he said. "But that's certainly not a requirement. We can always do it with students here."

However, the university has another reason for pushing to get the projects done: "We're trying to get things under way as quickly as possible to avoid any cost escalations that might come along," Decker said.

Planning for the future

Both McMahan House and the new academic building are part of a master plan that the board of trustees approved several years ago. The plan is designed to ensure that Cal State San Marcos' facilities continue to keep pace with its growing student population.

The university's goal is to have 25,000 students by 2020.

"We're basically trying to figure out how much square footage we'll need to accommodate them," Decker said. "So we're siting and master-planning extensively."

McMahan House is an example of how the extensive planning efforts can pay off. Named after a Pauma Valley family that donated $4.3 million to cover most of the project's cost, the meeting center will go on 4 acres atop a large knoll near the university's main entrance off Twin Oaks Valley Road.

The center will encompass 4,300 square feet and include a large catering kitchen and a grand dining room with seats for more than 100 people. Scheduled to be finished in March, McMahan House also will contain a library and at least two different meeting rooms, with all the buildings clustered around a large courtyard with a fireplace, a barbecue pit and extensive landscaping.

A permanent home

The social and behavioral sciences building will be built just east of the arts building near the center of campus. The $56.8 million structure will provide 106,509 square feet of classrooms, lecture halls and offices when it is finished in fall 2010.

The building, which is expected to open for classes in January 2011, also will have small conference rooms of its own and an area where graduate students can do research.

Graham Oberem, associate dean for budget and operations in the university's College of Arts & Sciences, said Friday that the building will provide the campus' social and behavioral science programs with their first permanent home.

"In the case of some of these departments, some of their lab space that they're using may be in one building, some of their classroom space may be in another, and their offices may be in (still) another building," Oberem said.

"The idea is to bring these departments together in a facility that's designed to meet the needs that they have, as opposed to trying to fit them into buildings that are already built but don't meet their needs," he said. "We believe that when you do it like this, you're doing it right, and it really does enhance the studying experience for students."

The parking structure that is planned will be the university's first. Scheduled to go to the board for approval in July, the project will include the extension of Campus View Drive.

Contact staff writer Andrea Moss at (760) 739-6654 or amoss@nctimes.com.