Yes, I’m really getting anxious to see this Lecture Hall project completed. Yes we are behind schedule, and there have been a plethora of reasons why we are behind schedule. I guess I could blame them on our project Superintendent since he is now retired and is not around to defend himself, but I won’t do that.

Currently we are now scheduled to be substantially complete on September 1. I say substantially complete because the project will not be totally finished on that date. There will be many loose ends to wrap up, but we should be able to move in and start getting things situated so that we may start using the building as intended at the start of the fall quarter.

Last Friday I took faculty member Bob Haft for another photography walk of the construction project. He shared an abundance of his images with me, some of them I share with you here:

Work in progress in Lecture Hall 1

Lecture Hall 1

Work in progress in Classroom 2

Exterior of Lecture Hall

One thing that I have not touched on with my previous updates is all the significant amount of work taking place at the lower level of the Lecture Hall. The lower level previously was a strange shaped room containing cubicles. Off of this room were inefficiently shaped storage spaces and custodial closets. This area is now primarily dedicated to mechanical and utility lines. Bob Haft told me all the new utility piping at this level reminded him of a building in Paris in which all the brightly colored piping, tubes and mechanical systems are exposed on the outside of the structure as an expression of technology at the time. I new exactly what building Bob was referring to being I remembered studying that building in architectural history class. Here is a photo I found of the building he mentioned:

Pompidou Centre, Paris, France

Anyway, this building was designed by a team of famous architects from Great Britain and Italy. It was very well disliked by Parisian’s when it was first completed, as was the Eiffel Tower when it was first completed. But the architectural community mostly loved it and it won many awards at the time in 1977. It is also a major attraction for tourists and supposedly Parisian’s now accept it, just as it took time for them to do so with the Eiffel Tower.

Well hardly any of you will ever be able to marvel at the number of mechanical lines, water pipes, electrical conduit, fire sprinkler lines, of mechanical units that lie below the new rotunda of the Lecture Hall, but Bob took a number of outstanding photos of these areas. One of my favorites is right here:

Mechanical level of Purce Hall

Well, lately for me it seem like everyone wants to tour the Lecture Hall. You can’t all do so yet. But if I had my way I would let you all take a peak for a mere $20 a piece, plus a $2.50 facility fee and a $7.80 convenience fee. I am also considering taking the green fence screen down so you could see more of what is going on behind the fencing. Let me know what you think.

There won’t be much activity taking place outside the building this week. Copious amounts of work will be taking place inside the building though. There is a mass amount of finish work going on, such as painting walls and ceilings, installing finished floors, finished ceiling tiles, acoustical wall panels, placing of light fixtures, and installing doors and windows. Soon you should see some landscaping work taking place as the site starts to come together.

You may have noticed there is really slow progress in painting of the “Purce Hall” sign out front. I’m not even sure why they started painting it being the focus is on getting the inside of the building complete. But it is strange that for a week or so you could just see “PU”. Now you can see the “PUR”. Can I buy a “C” Mr. Painter?

That is it for now. Have a great week!

Cheers,

Tim