Phase II of Legacy Park is set to finish in July and will be available to students for the fall semester. The construction includes a total of 28 new apartments in five different buildings, one of which will house Student Health Services and a leasing and rental office.
“It’s going very well, and we’re really pushing hard to get it all finished on time,” Danny Deramus, director of physical resources, said.
The three buildings will be located in the middle parking lot between Shores and Searcy Halls. The remaining two will be located behind Shores Hall on the other side of Remington Drive.
According to Deramus, the two-story near Remington will house Student Health Services on the first floor and apartments on the second floor. The building behind Shores will house a dorm manager’s apartment and an office building for rent and lease. The office will begin handling leasing of other apartments and all non-dorm spaces. There will be no new restaurants or businesses coming in during this phase.
Due to the construction, the middle parking lot between Shores and Searcy has lost 81 parking spaces while the parking lot near Shores and Pryor has lost 14 spaces.
“As far as parking being lost because of Legacy being built, it is sometimes harder than before to find a parking space,” junior and Shores RA Taylor Carrell said. “But I feel residents of Stephens and Searcy may have a harder time than those of us in Shores or Pryor, as parking there already seemed harder to come by.”
In order to compensate the loss, the Cone construction company has added 90 parking lots behind the nurse’s station. Though these additional parking lots are gravel at this point, this summer the company will pave the lot, which will replace the lost parking.
“This is the construction phase of it,” Wayne Westerholm, manager of parking and transportation, said. “Once these buildings are built, we’re going to recover 25 percent of those (lost 95 spaces). So then we’re not talking about a permanent loss, but we’re talking about temporary loss.”
Director of Public Safety Craig Russell said the new parking lots are a little further away but still an easy walking distance.
“It’s essentially the same number of slots we had before,” Russell said. “They just have been moved around a little bit, but it’s in the same general area.”
According to the Parking and Transportation office, the total number of permits for registered cars sold this school year is 5,185. If everyone were to bring their vehicles on campus at one time, every single parking space available on campus adds up to 5,452 slots. Therefore, the total number is 5,452 spaces versus 5,185 permits.
“We definitely have more than enough parking,” Westerholm said. “It is not always going to be the most convenient parking. But, we can pretty much assure you that you’re going to have parking relatively close to your dorm.”
Deramus said building a parking garage has been considered and is a possibility for the university in the future.
“I can see it in our future, but I don’t know how soon in our future,” Deramus said. “I can see one maybe over by the Benson area and maybe one over here (in Legacy Park phase II). But at this point, we do have parking and it’s available.”
