UTEP to build $23 million student housing complex

University of Texas at El Paso officials will announce this week the start of construction on UTEP’s newest student housing complex.

University President Diana Natalicio, Associate Vice President for Facilities Services Greg McNicol, and a representative from Tempe, Ariz.-based Sundt Construction, the project’s general contractor, will discuss the project on June 13, including its benefits to student success and degree completion, and its role in helping UTEP become a Tier One (national research) institution.

Sundt plans to break ground on the project in the next two weeks.

The 103,606-square-foot complex will sit on a 6.2-acre site behind the Helen of Troy Softball Complex off Sun Bowl Drive that overlooks an arroyo. It will consist of two four-story residential buildings that together will have 83 units that have combinations of one-bedroom efficiencies and four-bedroom suites with four or six beds. Each will have a small kitchen, living area and bathroom. The buildings, which can sleep 352 students, will have elevators, lobbies, lounges, study rooms and laundry facilities. There also will be a single-story commons building that will have a computer lab, kitchen, conference room, meeting hall and staff offices. Each building will use Bhutanese-style architecture.

The project, which will cost $23 million, was designed by El Paso-based Mijares-Mora Architects and KSQ Architects of Tulsa, Okla. KSQ specializes in student housing design.

The University operates two housing complexes that accommodate 636 students, and maintains a waiting list of about 200 students. The Campus Master Plan projects the University will provide 1,440 beds by 2015. This new project is the first phase of what is expected to become a 3,000-bed complex. Additional phases will be built as needed.

Source: UTEP