Plans are in the works to build an academic community for graduate students on south campus.

The project is part of a larger set of initiatives being developed to address increased demand for on-campus student housing.

“We hope that this will begin to address the urgent need for affordable graduate student housing,” said Steven Kremer, director of residence life.

Morrison Hall housed graduate students until last year when it was converted into undergraduate housing. Currently, Jones Tower is the only residence hall available for graduate students.

Undergraduates lost 379 beds in the Ohio Stadium dormitory because of renovation work, Kremer said. An additional 710 beds were lost when Archer and Lincoln Tower dorms were converted to administration buildings in the 1970s.

Kremer estimates the university had no room for at least 1,000 students that would have liked to live on-campus for this school year.

“At some point we put out the `No Vacancy` sign and it`s impossible to know how many students are turned away after that,” he said.

Kremer attributes the increased demand for on-campus student housing to increased numbers of undergraduates returning to the residence halls after their freshmen year and graduate students that want the convenience and safety of quality campus housing.

“Many grad students have to rent apartments without even looking at them because they`re not from around here,” said Amanda Callison, a graduate student in Food Science and Technology and planning committee representative for the council of graduate students. “This is a great project because it will offer graduate students apartments that meet their lifestyle needs with both academic convenience and privacy.”

The new dorms will house as many as 400 students and could be ready for occupancy in the fall of 2002.

But room for 400 will not meet demand and Kremer said another idea would be to convert Archer and Lincoln back into dorm rooms.

“That`s student space and even if we see a decrease in demand there`s still a need to reduce density and offer quality housing,” he said.

Kremer cited academic studies showing students that live on-campus are twice as likely to graduate as those that live off-campus and top academic universities where it is common for students to live on-campus all four years as important reasons for Ohio State to provide quality housing.

“We have not built a new residence hall in 30 years,” he said. “Our goal is to build the best and I think it`s going to be really fantastic.

“One of the strengths of our housing facilities is the diversity – we have all kinds of different living arrangements and this project will be a great addition to that diversity,” Kremer added.

The project is being designed by the architectural firms of Hanbury Evans Newill Vlattas and Co. of Virginia and Urs Greiner Woodward-Clyde of Columbus.

Though still in the early stages of planning, OSU officials and architects envision a unique academic community consisting of small apartment buildings and houses, built and designed in the architectural tradition of the surrounding neighborhood.

“We want to really do something that`s never been done,” said Keith Storms, project architect at Hanbury Evans.

“The project is unique in that, instead of being within the campus, it will be adjacent,” he said. “So there is an opportunity there to make an architectural transition from campus to community.”

The project will be built on the block between W. Ninth and W. Tenth avenues and Neil Avenue and Worthington Street on land already owned by the university.

While architects work on the initial design, Kremer said he is busy meeting with grad students to find out what is important to them.

“Do they need dishwashers or microwaves? Are showers okay or do they want bathtubs? These are the kinds of questions that need to be addressed,” Kremer said. “And most important is how much can they afford in rent?

“We want to build the nicest housing possible and still keep it within the budgets of our students,” he said.

Kremer will make a residence life presentation to the Board of Trustees at 7 p.m. on Friday at the College of Law.