North Campus
UB’s Amherst location has been the major campus of a flagship university for more than thirty years. It occupies nearly seven million square feet of built space; more than 27,000 people—students, faculty, and staff—go there every day.
But the North Campus has not been a well-loved place. This plan aims to make it more accessible, more sociable, more sustainable, and more beautiful.
The plan is intended to build on the existing assets of the campus—a distinguished faculty, a large and talented student body, a manmade lake, open landscape, and an active athletics program—to create an engaging place for learning and a home for the academic heart of the university, the College of Arts and Sciences, plus the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences and elements of the School of Management.
The overall strategy of the plan is to use new programs and buildings to thicken the Academic Spine, to build a “Main Street” connection between the Spine and the Ellicott Complex, and to create a stronger connection to Lake LaSalle.
Featured elements in the plan include a new lakefront open space called “The Oval;” a new recreation, fitness, and wellness facility; a campus hotel and conference center; and redevelopment of restaurant and retail services.
“Learning landscape” concepts will find expression across the campus in an array of “hubs” for study, technology, media, and teaching, and a network of spaces for eating, socializing, and studying.
The plan will also begin a transformation of the North Campus landscape, naturalizing areas of the outer campus to save money and energy, retaining storm water, and reinvesting in landscaping to make the inner campus more beautiful and to protect it from the weather.
Traffic-calming on Audubon Parkway, Putnam Way, and Lee Road will help make the North Campus more pedestrian friendly. Rights of way are being reserved for future transit improvements. Better accommodations for cyclists are included in the plan.
Overall, the plan aims to make the North Campus a place that people can truly love.
