SIU Trustees are considering the future of several aging buildings on the Carbondale campus, and spent time Wednesday touring parts of Greek Row to see first-hand what their options are.
Roughly half of the buildings in that area are in use as offices, but the other half sit vacant – many in need of repair and renovation. Plant and Service Operations Director Phil Gatton says upgrades may be difficult – and expensive.
“So you generally have low floor-to-ceiling heights, you have cheaply constructed buildings as far as single-pane windows and block walls with no insulation in them. So the conversion of those type of structures, even though it maybe looks a little better than older buildings, oftentimes you don’t get a very good bang for your buck.”
About half of the buildings in the area are in use as offices, while the other half sit vacant, in varying states of disrepair. SIU Board Architecture and Design Committee Chair Don Lowery says some could be renovated.
“There’s no doubt that there’s some renovations required, but any building that is 40 years old is going to require some renovations.”
Trustees are trying to decide whether to renovate the buildings for use as offices, tear them down and build new structures, or some combination of those options.