Penn State proposes first new West Campus College of Engineering Building
Penn State is planning the first in a series of new buildings part of its West Campus Master Plan and the expansion of the College of Engineering.
West 2, a 98,000-square-foot academic building, will share a wall with the West Campus Parking Deck — which faced some community pushback over the last year and a half — that is currently under construction. The building will house the School of Engineering, Design and Technology programs, the Learning Factory and the Factory for Advanced Manufacturing Education (FAME) Lab.
At the State College Planning Commission meeting Wednesday, Mark Saville, group manager for engineering firm HRG, Inc., presented the preliminary plan for West 2, which includes includes a high-bay space, research cores and labs, teaching and studio spaces, administration and faculty spaces and undergraduate and graduate student spaces.
The design of the building, Saville said, emphasizes “integrative active learning on display” through makerspaces and open floor plans.
West 2 will be designed to LEED standards “and beyond,” he said, with large skylights designed for optimal daylighting and a mechanism to include a solar array in the future. Neighboring West Campus Parking Deck is being constructed with solar capacity, and crews are installing conduits to meet that standard for the future, he said.
West 2 and the forthcoming West 1 will house the programs currently located in the Hammond and Sackett buildings. Hammond is slated for demolition in the next few years.
The proposed building will frame the Engineering Quad, which Penn State plans to redesign, along with the Electrical Engineering Sciences, Leonhard and Academic Support buildings.
The building’s main access will be on the northeast end, adjacent to the EES building, while its southern access will be near Leonhard and the bicycle maintenance and storage facility in the parking deck. It will also include a service yard area for makerspace projects that need to be pulled outside for further work or storage.
This story was originally published February 6, 2020 at 5:00 AM.
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