WATERVILLE — Construction projects are in full swing this summer at the Colby College campus in Waterville, with major work underway on a rotary at the intersection of Mayflower Hill and Campus drives.
Work is also continuing on athletic fields and the Gordon Center for Creative and Performing Arts, development of a child care center at the Millett House and efforts to make the campus more pedestrian-friendly, according to college officials.
The projects are all about supporting the academic experience and improving accessibility and availability to students, faculty staff and the community, according to Brian Clark, vice president of planning at Colby.
The small rotary is being built where Mayflower Hill Drive intersects with Campus Drive, as one approaches the college campus from the North Street hill. The work is to help ensure traffic moves smoothly and safely through the area encompassing the new, $200 million Harold Alfond Athletics and Recreation Center, athletic fields and the new campus green, according to Clark. Sidewalks and bike lanes are being added as part of the work.
“It allows that to become a much more coherent, cohesive and comprehensive experience,” Clark said Thursday in a phone interview.
A similar rotary, also with single lanes of traffic in all directions, is to be built next summer at the intersection of Campus Drive and Washington Street, near the new athletic center, according to Clark.
“The work started a few weeks ago — in late June — and the intersection work will be completed by mid-August when all of our students will be returning to campus,” he said.
Colby is accustomed to launching such construction projects in the summer, and this season’s work represents a set of comprehensive improvements, some that were deferred last year because of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to Clark.
Also on campus, major utility replacement and reconstruction are underway on Bixler Drive, near the Colby College Museum of Art. Bixler will become a pedestrian-only walkway that will connect with other walkways through campus, Clark said.
Runnals Drive and Cotter Drive also are scheduled to become pedestrian-only. The connected walkways are designed to help make the campus more pedestrian-friendly, with less vehicle traffic and more opportunity for interaction between people, he said. Meanwhile, a new access road off Mayflower Hill Drive has been built near the museum that leads to a parking area.
A bypass road will eventually be built for vehicles to use as the pedestrian ways are developed to connect all areas of campus, including the Alfond Athletics and Recreation Center and nearby athletic fields.
“It allows us to really enhance the accessibility of our campus,” Clark said.
Site and excavation work is being done off Mayflower Hill Drive as part of the future $80 million Gordon Center for Creative and Performing Arts, where the blasting of ledge has been occurring all week. The three-story, 74,000-square-foot center, to include a performance hall, studios for music, theater and dance, a cinema studies space and faculty offices, is scheduled to open in August 2023.
The new athletic fields and landscaping around them off Campus Drive are expected to be completed this summer.
The Millett Alumni House off the opposite end of Mayflower Hill Drive and Mount Merici Avenue is being transformed into a child care center for Colby faculty and staff, a project the college has been planning for some time, according to Clark. Colby is partnering with Happy Days Childcare and Learning Center in Winslow on the center, which is scheduled to open in the fall and for which about 20 children have signed up, he said.
Construction crews work on the foundation of the Paul J. Schupf Art Center on Main Street in downtown Waterville on Thursday. Michael G. Seamans/Morning Sentinel
A new building entrance and vestibule is being built and outdoor play structures added. The Millett House had been used in recent years for a variety of activities, including temporary office space and small group meetings.
Aside from projects happening on campus, work by Colby continues downtown with construction of the $18 million Paul J. Schupf Art Center, developments at the Arts Collaborative at the lower end of Main Street, preparations being made to the $26 million Lockwood Hotel to bring students back there in the fall for at least one semester and road construction which Colby is helping to fund.
The 53-room hotel housed students last year during the pandemic, and a date has not yet been set for when it will start accepting hotel guests. Front & Main, the bar and restaurant on the ground floor, has been busy.
The Center at 93 Main St. has been razed and debris removed, and framing for the concrete foundation for the future Schupf Center is being installed. The center is scheduled to open late next year, according to Clark.
Across the street from the Lockwood Hotel, the Colby-owned Arts Collaborative has been supporting and hosting artists.
“We’re really excited to have these buildings be part of Main Street,” Clark said, “and be able to finally get people into the buildings.”
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