Thread: UC San Diego begins building largest complex in campus history, housing for 2,000

UC San Diego begins building largest complex in campus history

Gary Robbins Contact Reporter


Once again, you’ll need ear plugs to block the din of construction at UC San Diego.

Faced with intense pressure to grow, the university on Monday will begin building the largest complex in campus history, a $627 million neighborhood that includes housing for 2,000 students, academic towers, parking and retail space.

The North Torrey Pines Living and Learning Center (NTPLLN) represents the start of a $1.6 billion expansion that will enable the La Jolla campus to add at least 3,300 students by 2021, pushing enrollment to 40,000.

Enrollment could eventually hit 45,000, making UC San Diego the same size as UCLA and almost three times larger than Stanford.

The new building boom follows one that is just wrapping up. Over the next few years, UC San Diego will add: the Design and Innovation Center, the Franklin Antonio Engineering building, the Nuevo East and Nuevo West graduate housing complex, and Triton Pavilion, a large student center.

The pavilion also will be a major stop on the Blue Line when trolley service is extended between downtown San Diego and University City in 2021.

The trolley will link the campus to the core of a city that’s undergoing its own building boom; at least 2,000 new apartments will open in the downtown area this year.

The UC San Diego expansion program is meant, in part, to accommodate enrollment growth that’s being driven by the state’s booming population and the prestige of University of California campuses. In a comparatively short period of time, UC San Diego has become the fifth largest research school in the country.

The program’s heavy emphasis on adding affordable campus housing, student services and retail space also is meant to make the campus more livable and lively.

Students joke that the school’s initials stand for University of California Socially Dead. That sort of reputation can make it difficult to compete for the best students.

“We want to give students, faculty and staff reasons to be here rather than some place else in San Diego,” said Matthew Smith, the project manager for the NTPLLN.

This new neighborhood will become the home of Sixth College, one of the six individual colleges spread across campus. Over a 26-month period, the university will add separate classroom and office buildings for the social sciences and the arts and humanities, housing for 2,000 students, 1,200 underground parking spaces, a craft center, retail space, a dining hall and a market.

At the same time, the campus will improve the appearance and flow of Ridge Walk, one of the university’s most heavily trafficked pedestrian and bike corridors.

“Usually academic buildings are built by themselves, and then residence halls at a different time and somewhere else,” said Carol Padden, dean of the Division of Social Sciences, which has about 8,000 students.

“But this time, academic buildings and residence halls are going up together to build a living and learning neighborhood. This is what students want — to feel that they're coming to a place that has a sense of being a community.”

The NTPLLN also is meant to provide something else that’s in high demand and short supply: affordable housing.

Many students have been priced out of the rental market in La Jolla. A studio apartment costs about $1,700 a month, according to CoStar, the real estate information company. A one-bedroom apartment costs about $2,100 and a two-bedroom costs about $2,700.

The rent in the new campus housing will be offered at far below market value, the university says.

Nearly 15,500 students currently live in campus housing. The NTPLLN and Nuevo East and West will add about 4,200 beds, and further housing will be added.

UC San Diego will exploit its location on the California coast. As Smith says, “There’s no excuse for wasting the view or our lovely days.”

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California in building boom