For the past year, Eugene city planners and the University have been working together on a 20-year plan for the city of Eugene — known as Envision Eugene — which will provide additional housing resources for students and community members.
One facet of the plan involves offering housing options to University students, who will make up a significant portion of new residents.
“Certainly the growing number of students is addressed in the plan,” Terri Harding, Envision Eugene public involvement manager, said. “We’ve been working with the University to figure out numbers and where these students are going to be living.”
Envision Eugene estimates the city will grow by 34,000 people within the next 20 years, and it focuses on providing living space for the anticipated population boom.
The project has four main components: additional downtown development, tools and incentives to make this downtown development happen, industrial land strategies and neighborhood livability.
Harding also pointed out that many students are moving into apartment complexes on East 19th Avenue, which is changing the character of this neighborhood.
“The interface between the University and the neighborhoods plays a role in the proposal,” Harding said. “We want to improve livability for students and the neighborhoods.”
Though the University has seen housing shortages in recent years — a problem Envision Eugene hopes to indirectly alleviate — senior associate director of housing Allen Gidley said he anticipates that the majority of first-year freshman will be able to live on campus in the coming years.
“We’ve made some adjustments in our housing stock and we’ve added roughly 130 beds to the system by tripling up some of the larger spaces and in addition to the more beds that provides, it also provides a pretty cost effective option for students because for a triple it’s less expensive than a double or single,” Gidley said.
Campus Planning and Real Estate is looking to have the East Campus Residence Hall, which is currently under construction, open by Fall 2012 to accommodate these growing numbers of incoming students.
University pre-business administration major Brian Allen lived in the residence halls his freshman year, an experience that not all incoming students can be a part of.
“It was a great experience. You’re forced to broaden your horizons and meet new people,” Allen said, who serves as the ASUO campus outreach coordinator.
Allen said his parents lived in the residence halls when they went to school and had similar experiences.
“Living in the dorms is something I think everyone should experience,” Allen said. “I think that 20 years from now, it will still be an important part of student life.”
However, not all incoming students are able to experience this because the number of incoming students is larger than the amount of beds available in the residence halls.
“As the freshman class at the University has increased, our housing space has not increased,” Gidley said. “We don’t have more beds just because there have been more students coming to the University. We are building a new residence hall for fall 2012; roughly 450 (beds).”
University freshman Lisa Cordial was not able to secure a spot in one of the residence halls and decided to move to apartments nearby.
“I was very upset about not being allowed the experience to live in the dorms as a freshman,” Cordial said. “Though most people won’t ever do it a second time, I believe it is a rite of passage.”
Cordial feels that living off-campus made her a little bit of an outsider, because she missed out on meeting people her own age, who are in similar situations.
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