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BY MARY PRAGER

In print | February 28, 2008

David Kemp Hall will be complete and ready to welcome new residents in time for Alumni Weekend in June, and more importantly, for the upcoming fall semester. Construction is proceeding on schedule and without glitches, and The Phoenix took a special tour of the interior.

“We have 90 percent of the underground and the drainage complete,” Project Manager Mike Boyd said as he took Phoenix news reporter Mary Prager ’11 and photographer Katherine Koch ’08 on a guided tour of the hall.

In addition, all of the heating, air conditioning, electric, and plumbing utilities have been completed. Furniture for the dorm rooms will arrive on May 15, and within the next two weeks, construction workers will focus on finishing up rooms, landscaping and building a stone plaza. “So we’re well on our way,” Boyd said.

Boyd showed The Phoenix a spacious single with natural light flooding in on the second floor. “This might be an RA’s [room],” he said. Electrical wiring, not yet connected to a bulb or other fixture, extended from the wall. The walls were painted white, the floor uncarpeted — so that residents and maintenance will not have to deal with stains, he said. Other rooms were not as far along. The bottom third of a wall was covered in what appears to be black paint, but is actually waterproofing. In the same area a sediment of cement and sedum was visible, and above that was a material called green board, which is resistant to mildew and moisture.

Later along the tour, Boyd led the staff to a single with wide windows overlooking the green roof — his favorite, he said. Boyd explained that the windows are thermal double-paired and filled with argon gas. “Probably the best energy value you can get out of a window,” he said.

“We’re checking to make sure everything is [Americans with Disabilities Act] compliant,” Boyd said. He walked the staff around another room. It was still dusty and not completely tiled, but it was unmistakably a bathroom. Boyd discussed the water system, a pumped water loop that circulates hot water near faucets to provide on-demand heat.

According to Boyd, the construction team has managed to avoid any significant problems. “We have a fantastic architect, Rawn Associates,” Boyd said. “And the construction crew is just amazing.” Ensuring ADA compliancy is a meticulous task for the crew, because the regulations prohibit any deviation from the federal standards for handicap accessible design. Regarding the recent settlement between the college and the Department of Justice, Boyd discussed plans to hire a consultant firm to work with the college to help identify problems.

“Overall, the construction’s going great,” Housing Coordinator Liz Derickson ’01 said. On Wednesday, Derickson is scheduled to take her second tour of the dorm this year.

As the housing lotteries approach, Derickson and the Housing Committee have been discussing next year’s housing. Last week, they met to discuss how rooms in the new hall should be blocked. Projected to house 76 residents in the fall, Kemp is likely to be a popular choice for next year, although the RA application forms that Derickson has reviewed so far do not precisely reflect this. “I wouldn’t say [David Kemp Hall]’s been wildly popular … but it also clearly hasn’t gone unnoticed,” Derickson says.

David Kemp Hall is structurally related to Alice Paul, so the aesthetics of the building are not new - future residents will know what to expect. There are no lofted doubles, but the dorm has the tall windows and minimalist aesthetic of Alice Paul, said Derickson, who added that Kemp is designed to function in tandem with Alice Paul - including sharing the red lounge and a courtyard with a grill.

While the dorm’s completion and opening are sure to be exciting for all, residents of Alice Paul and Mertz will be particularly relieved once the construction finishes. Only 35 feet separate Kemp and the closest section of Mertz, and for Alice Paul, only ten, not nearly enough to shelter residents from the bangs and clangs of construction.

According to second floor Mertz RA Susannah Gund ’08, Mike Boyd gave Mertz and Alice Paul RAs a special tour of the dorm in the fall of 2007. Boyd also sends e-mail updates to residents regarding the construction.

Like other RAs in Mertz and Alice Paul, Gund has had to deal with residents’ complaints regarding the noise and other problems. Gund lives on the south side of Mertz, which is near the construction, but closer to the center of the dorm. “I’ve gotten fewer complaints now, but I think that’s because the people who’ve had major sound problems or other concerns may have contacted Mike Boyd or Liz Derickson,” she said. A more recent issue has been the closing off of the driveway behind Mertz. Gund said that people can no longer pull up their cars. Regardless, Gund was excited about the new dorm.

A new circular driveway will lead up to the back of David Kemp Hall, facing Chester Road. “We’re eliminating the circle that used to be behind Mertz, leaving a narrow lane for service vehicles,” Boyd said.

“Now that it’s more interior work, I think there’s been a fundamental shift,” Derickson said with regard to complaints made by residents of Mertz and Alice Paul. The loudest construction was due to the exterior work, said Derickson, most of which was done in the fall, and particularly the masonry. The beeping sound emitted by vehicles backing up is still noisy, but necessary, and, she said, the more acute disturbances have stopped.

As residents of Alice Paul in particular have noticed, rainy weather floods the path that winds around the stored construction equipment on Mertz lawn. When the weather clears up, the contractor plans to raise the path to prevent such flooding.

One of the final steps in the completion of the dorm will be removing the equipment placed on Mertz lawn, and opening up that pathway. “To be able to use Mertz lawns as a storage place was a big help for the construction,” Boyd said. The construction workers will reestablish the land as a lawn.

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