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  • Campus Construction Update, March 28, 2025
    2025/03/28
    This episode of Campus Construction Update features host Dave Blanks from University Communications in conversation with Associate Vice Chancellor of Facilities Management Nick Katers. They discuss ongoing and upcoming construction projects on campus including the restoration of the campus bell tower chimes, the completion of the new women’s softball field and major infrastructure improvements such as road closures, new traffic lights and the continued development of the Innovation Campus. The episode provides insight into the challenges and progress of these projects highlighting efforts to enhance campus safety, sustainability and student facilities. Transcript: Dave: Hey, folks, how's it going? I'm Dave Blanks from University Communications back with another Campus Construction Update video edition, and I'm joined by Mr. Nick Katers, hello, the Associate Vice Chancellor of Facilities Management. Welcome back to the studio, Nick. Nick: It's great to be here again. Dave: I'm glad you're here. Well, summertime's not upon us yet, it's not even spring yet, but we're talking about some of the summer projects that we have on tap and some of the things that we've checked off our list, one of which you can hear if you've come to campus. Nick: Absolutely. Dave: Yeah. Nick: So the bells are back by popular demand. We have repaired the chimes in the steam tower/bell tower, so you can hear them every hour on the hour. And we'll start mixing it up as we go forward here a little bit, so it'll get a little bit more exciting. Dave: What are we talking about, mixing it up? Nick: Oh, we've played music before. Dave: Okay. Nick: So I think we can gauge the mood of the campus and really be appropriate. Some good wins on some of these sports teams, we could get out there. Dave: Oh, sweet. Nick: Maybe not a little AC/DC, but something- Dave: Very appropriate for the bell tower. Exactly. Well, cool. Well, all right, so what happened to it? Why was it broken? Nick: It kind of wore out over a number of years, so a pretty expensive sound system was in there. And just from weather and everything else that it was faced with, it broke down right before COVID. And then we just never got around to replacing it. But this year, thanks to some initiative from my team, we've got the bells working again. Dave: I think our videographer, Malia, I don't know that she even knew that there were bells in the steam tower, so that's exciting. All right, well what else, Nick? Nick: I also want to just point out that the new women's softball field out at the old high school site App 105 is complete. And that's been a huge goal of ours to get this done for the start of the softball season. And the first women's home softball game is this Friday, the 21st of March at 12 o'clock. So we'll be able to sort of inaugurate our new stadium and it looks fantastic. Dave: It is beautiful. Nick: Yes. Dave: Yeah, it really is nice. And that's out on 105? Nick: Yeah, 105 where the old high school location was. Dave: Watauga High. Nick: Right. It's also outdoor tennis, the track and field complex, and now adding softball. Pretty soon we'll be adding the indoor tennis facility as well. Dave: Okay. Well, where does that go? It's kind of hard for this, but where is that in association? Nick: Between the track and field area and the new softball field? It'll be attached to the new field house that we have there. So this will be six indoor tennis courts. It'll be a fantastic facility. Dave: Sweet. Wow, that is wonderful. Nick: Yes. Dave: Well, cool. What else? Nick: So you've probably noticed we've got a lot of construction going on on campus right now. Dave: I noticed. Nick: We're at 43 projects, $350 million worth of placement, and it causes a lot of chaos across campus. One of the areas that's been hit the hardest is the Peacock AppalCart Circle. So we've been trying to slide it around and move it around in order to make it as safe as possible. So I think we've finally settled on not moving it out of the Peacock lot, but sliding it closer to River Street. We've now restricted the traffic to one way and we're putting the bus shelter in the middle of a circle, so I think it'll be much more efficient. We won't have to have students with their backs up against the fence where they're up against the construction fence. So it'll stay this way for the rest of the semester and then we'll look at what we're going to do with it during the summer. But I anticipate until Peacock and Duncan are complete with their construction, we'll have to have that AppalCart stop there. And it'll be a while before those finish up. Duncan will finish up in the fall, the Peacock edition, which you can't even really visualize yet because it's just now starting to come out of the ground, that'll be done in the fall of '26. Dave: Okay, excellent. All right. Nick: In addition to that, we've had Bodenheimer closed for about three months as we've been working near Mountaineer Hall to ...
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    13 分
  • Campus Construction Update, November 6, 2024
    2024/11/06
    Dave Blanks sits down with Nick Katers, Appalachian State’s Associate Vice Chancellor of Facilities Management, to talk about the new addition to Peacock Hall, home of the largest undergraduate College of Business in the UNC system. The two discuss the history of the Walker College of Business, the reasons behind the expansion to Peacock Hall, and what folks can expect during and after the project. Nick shares how this $40 million project is part of a phased transformation, set to finish in August 2026, that will ultimately include the long-awaited “daylighting” of Boone Creek to bring natural spaces to campus. Find out what’s next for this landmark project at Appalachian State! (Recorded September 18, 2024) TRANSCRIPT Dave Blanks: Hey folks. How's it going? I'm Dave Blanks from University Communications back with another campus construction update. I am joined today in studio by Nick Katers, Associate Vice Chancellor of Facilities Management. Howdy, Nick. How's it going? Nick Katers: Dave, it's good to be a part of this first one on video. Dave Blanks: Man, I know. I'm excited. It's very different. We've been exposed. Here we are. This is what we actually look like. Nick Katers: Right. Dave Blanks: Yeah, so we'll see how it goes. Today's topic is Peacock Hall, the addition to Peacock. Here's the plan for today. We'll see if I pull it off. We're going to start off with a little history lesson that'll take us up to present day just about the College of Business at Appalachian State. Nick Katers: Sure. Dave Blanks: After I get through with that, we're going to discuss the need for the addition, which is the topic today, and then we'll share some details on what that addition consists of, who it's going to benefit, how long is it going to take, what's the impact that we're going to deal with while it's being constructed and then just some of the positive stuff that's going to happen after it's built. Nick Katers: Great. Okay. Dave Blanks: So, yeah, how does that sound? Good plan? Nick Katers: It sounds good. Dave Blanks: I'm going to start out with my history lesson of the College of Business. Before I went to business.appstate.edu, I knew some of this, I didn't know all of this. We're starting in 1970, when the College of Business is officially founded at Appalachian State. So when it started, small and business classes were held in Smith-Wright Hall, which was part of the New Deal. It was a public works administration building, funded and completed by the PWA, and it was completed in 1940. Interesting little bit of history there. It's the current home of the Department of Psychology and it's right next door to us. But they weren't in there for long because Walker Hall was completed in 1975 and the College of Business moved there in '76. Walker College of Business and Walker Hall are both named in honor of John A. Walker. He was a Lowe's Company's founding director and always a strong supporter of Appalachian State and the College of Business. 15 years later, 1990, faculty and staff moved from Walker into a new College of Business building, 130,000 square feet, four-story structure in the middle of App's campus, named and dedicated in honor of Thelma, C. Raley. The dedication came in '93, the building was built in 1990. Then in 2014, with the Raley family's blessing, Raley Hall became Peacock Hall in honor of outgoing Chancellor Dr. Kenneth Peacock. And that takes us up to the addition is the next thing. But yeah, interesting history of the Walker College of Business. You can check it out at business.appstate.edu and we'll also put it in the show notes. Today's topic is the addition at Peacock Hall. So can we discuss a little bit about the need for the addition? We've mentioned it on previous campus construction updates, but why do we need an addition to Peacock? Nick Katers: Well, I think you could start out with just by looking at the age of Peacock, former Raley Hall, like you said, built in 1990. It's 30 years old, so it was time to start considering a renovation. So a renovation of 130,000 square foot building is pretty expensive. At the same time the college of business is growing and growing and growing and it's literally bursting from the amount of students that are now involved in this program. Dave Blanks: What were you telling me that about the- Nick Katers: It's the largest undergraduate college of business in the UNC system. Dave Blanks: Wow. Nick Katers: And you wouldn't think that here. We're famous for a lot of things, teachers, nurses, stuff, but the College of Business, it was a little unexpected to hear that fact. But what that really meant is they had to make a choice. Do we want to do the renovation and take the building offline or do we want to try to make more space for it? So it's kind of a phased project. They made the decision to construct an addition. So again, the renovation probably would've cost in the neighborhood of 50 to 65 million dollars three or four ...
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    17 分
  • Campus Construction Update, August 16, 2024
    2024/08/16
    Associate Vice Chancellor of Facilities Management Nick Katers and Vice Provost of Academic Program Development and Strategic Initiatives Mike McKenzie join University Communications’ Dave Blanks in studio to discuss Edwin Duncan Hall’s use as a space for art classes during the 2024-25 academic year, as well as the opening of the Holmes Drive Parking Deck, upgrades to the University Post Office and construction progress at the Appalachian 105 sports complex. New classroom spaces at App State's Hickory campus and parking changes for the Duncan Rankin/Peacock lots are also highlighted, along with the start of construction for the Peacock Hall addition project. TRANSCRIPT Dave Hey, folks, how's it going? I'm Dave Blanks from University Communications. Back with another campus construction update. I'm joined in the studio today by associate vice chancellor of facilities management, Mr. Nick Katers and vice provost of academic program development and strategic Initiatives Dr. Mike McKenzie. Today, it's a discussion of what to expect when you're returning to campus. Hello guys. Thanks for coming in. Nick Katers Hey. Mike McKenzie Yeah, thanks for having me. Dave Yeah, we appreciate it. You guys are regulars, I love it. I'm glad. I'm glad. You have great information. Nick, I guess we'll start out with you. Can you give us a little bit of a summary of everything that's gone on over the summer? As it has been a lot. Nick Katers It has been a lot. This is one of the busiest summers we've had. First off, the Holmes parking deck is open. 600 more parking spaces, for the university to be able to use. Also, the post office renovation is complete and that's going to be a fantastic new technology upgrade there. So you won't have to go up to the counter. Nick Katers You'll be able to go in and swipe in with your card. A locker will appear and you'll be able to go and take your stuff out of the locker for that day. So it's a completely automated post office. Nobody will have set boxes anymore. There'll be dynamic reassignment of boxes, and that's, that's really kind of a fascinating upgraded way to do mail. Nick Katers Also, we've been very successful with the weather this summer. So the App 105 Sports Complex is hitting a milestone this summer, too. We've finished the outdoor tennis courts, we're finishing up the women's softball. And we also have the auxiliary building finished up. That just leaves one more phase to go and that's the indoor tennis facility. Nick Katers Down at Hickory, we have three new classrooms coming online for this fall semester, all on the second floor. It's the beginning of the second floor renovation. Three new classrooms will include a laboratory space, a general computer science lab and a cybersecurity lab. So all of those happened over the summer. Also, we're really close on a couple of new traffic lights, and I'll talk traffic at the end here for what the construction impact is. Nick Katers But we're going to get a new traffic light at Hill Street to accommodate people crossing River Street from the new parking deck. Then the traffic light will be reinstalled out at App 105 to allow kids to get in and out of that giant parking lot a lot easier. And then the biggest accomplishment, I think, over the summer, was getting all of the functions that were still in Wey Hall, out of Wey Hall and redistributed to the other positions on campus. Nick Katers I’ll let Mike talk about where they went. Dave Yeah! Please, Mike, share with us. I mean, I've been keeping my eye on the Octagon as I've been walking past, and I know that's a part of it. Mike McKenzie Right, Yeah. So, Dave, if you remember, we talked previously about Wey Hall, just how it was unique in that that whole ground floor were not spaces that were really replicated anywhere on campus. It wasn't just as simple as, hey, this place needs a classroom. I can find you a classroom. These were places that very unique artistic skills and machinery that were needed that we just had to find completely new homes for. Mike McKenzie And so, yeah, to Nick's point, over the summer, a lot of that is moving into the Octagon portion of Duncan. The other portion of Duncan is still undergoing construction, but we have been able to fit most things that were in Wey Hall into the Octagon. But if I give you a quick rundown just for students who are taking... whether they're art majors or are taking, you know, some of their gen ed requirements in that area, so they'll know where to go. Mike McKenzie We are still using East Hall some. So students who are in the DigiLab, which is like the laser cutting lab or the alternative processes lab for photography, will still be on level one of East Hall. Level two of East Hall will still have art education, the book arts. fibers and some of our design studios, painting studios and senior studios workshops. Mike McKenzie Also in East Hall, we ...
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    12 分
  • Campus Construction Update, July 16, 2024
    2024/07/16
    Associate Vice Chancellor of Facilities Management Nick Katers and Vice Provost of Academic Program Development and Strategic Initiatives Mike McKenzie join University Communications' Dave Blanks in studio to discuss progress on the second-floor renovation of App State's Hickory campus, as well as the finishing touches that are being applied to the Holmes Drive Parking Deck. Transcript Dave Blanks Hey, folks, how's it going? I'm Dave Blanks from University Communications. Back with another Campus Construction Update. Today I'm joined in studio by Associate Vice Chancellor of Facilities Management, Mr. Nick Katers and Vice Provost of Academic Program Development and Strategic Initiatives, Dr. Mike McKenzie for a discussion about the App State Hickory campus. Guys, thank you both so much for being here today. I appreciate it. Nick Katers Thanks, Dave. Mike McKenzie Thanks for having us. Dave Blanks So the topic at hand is the Hickory Campus. Hickory opened up to its inaugural class of mountaineer students on August 21st, 2023, and now phase two renovations are underway. So that's our topic for today. So I don't know if Nick, you want to start it out. This is phase two. Obviously phase one is complete. How many phases in the Hickory campus. Nick Katers So you know, we've probably we're probably looking at five phases. Initially we had a very generous appropriation from the state legislature for $41 million, and it was spread out over four years. So we realized that we couldn't just attack the entire building at the same time, and we would have to phase the building according to floor. So there are five above ground floors. So there will be five phases to the entire project. The good news here is that the $41 million appropriation is no longer spread out over four years. It's only spread out over two. So we'll be able to attack the second floor, in good order and more quickly than we had previously anticipated. So right now we're in Phase 2a, which, you know, Phase 2 is assume the second floor. Phase 2a is a very small improvement to the second floor. We're really focused on the addition of three new classrooms on the second floor. There's essentially a computer lab, a cyber security lab and a general chemistry lab. So I can let Mike kind of tell what went into the selection of those three. But again, we were working off the initial funding model, which didn't have a lot of money this year. And so we can talk about the future phases as well. Dave Blanks Sure. Yeah. Mike, speak to the classrooms. Mike McKenzie Sure. So as Nick mentioned, we have three new spaces that we're really excited about because there's a big need for them, frankly, based on the academic interest of the students there and where we see the future going with Hickory. So space one, as Nick mentioned, is a cybersecurity lab and Appalachian State last year had approval to offer a standalone bachelor's in cybersecurity. We have a cybersecurity lab that we're building in Boone. And now we also have one in Hickory. And what really makes the cyber lab cool is we've worked with Dr. Scott Hunsinger and his colleagues and other faculty to really design this to be state of the art. They told us what works for them from a, you know, a student experience and kind of where we landed.... the best way to describe it, I would say there's these pods where students work together and there's a control room where the faculty member can do things like send attacks at the students in real time, they have to kind of fend these off. And one of the biggest things that I learned very early on in talking to our IT folks is because of the nature of what cyber does, it is really important that they, in simplest terms, have their standalone computer network. You don't want to just use regular computers. So they kind of needed their own network to be able to do this. So they have this unique space that really is designated for cyber security. The other two spaces that we're really excited about that are opening this fall... one is a computer lab, and that space kind of doubles between when it's not in use as a classroom, students can obviously go and complete their work, but a lot of the programs that we've had interest in are, frankly, College of Business courses, and a lot of those require some technical computer programs and things that a student wouldn't just have on their standalone laptop at home, for example. So, having this lab with the specifications that the faculty need to teach these upper level courses to the students, and then the final space that we're really excited about for fall is this kind of general science lab. And so, you know, we do have a large number of students who are taking general education courses down there. Obviously a component in every gen ed is there's a science course, and we have not been able to teach a lab in person. You know, there are some online labs that we've been able to do, but we don't have a ...
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    18 分
  • Campus Construction Update, June 14, 2024
    2024/06/15
    App State Director of Planning, Design and Construction Jeff Pierce and University Interior Designer Jacki McGuire join University Communications' Dave Blanks in studio to discuss a number of ongoing campus construction and renovation projects at App State, including renovations to Edwin Duncan Hall and the University Post Office. TRANSCRIPT Dave Blanks Hey, folks, this is Dave Blanks from University Communications back with a Campus Construction Update. And I'm really happy to have Mr. Jeff Pierce and Jacki McGuire in the house. Hey, Jeff and Jacki how are y'all? Jeff Pierce Hey, Dave, it's good to be back with you. Jacki McGuire Hey Dave. Dave Blanks I know y'all are good because you've been talking, like, nonstop since you came in here, so... Jeff Pierce It's always a good time with you, Dave and on podcasts. Dave Blanks I mean, you know, It is fun, and I'm glad that you're down here. And, that's the kind of energy we want, you know, for a podcast. Because if you're not talking, podcasts are pretty dull. Jeff Pierce Go figure. Dave Blanks Yeah, I know! Weird right? So Jeff Pierce, the director of planning, design and construction, and Jacki McGuire, the university's interior designer. Great to have you both. And on the, podcast today, we're going to talk about, a few different things, an overview of some of the bigger projects that are going on, here in Boone, also in Hickory, also going to discuss the post office, which is getting a big change. It looks great in there. It looks really cool. I've seen some artist renderings, some mock ups. And then we're going to get specific on Edwin Duncan. But first off, Jeff, if you don't mind starting with, kind of a broad overview, get up, get up high for, for a view of the of the school and what we're doing. Jeff Pierce Will do! We're doing $300 million worth of construction between the main campus here at Boone and the Hickory campus, the innovation campus, which is the old Broyhill Inn site, we're doing faculty housing units up there through a public private partnership, as well as a district energy system, which we're putting in geothermal wells. We're putting in solar and putting in two additional wind turbines as well, to provide that hilltop up there with energy. As we move down the hill, we're doing construction work at Wey Hall. It’s a full renovation of Wey Hall which is the arts building. We come across the street there at Edwin Duncan. We'll talk about more of that later. We'll go down the street. We're doing some minor projects. Katherine Harper Kerr Scott, as we're moving the people out of Wey Hall, we're moving some of them into there as well, over into the Octagon and East Hall and then down in Hickory, we're doing a, renovation on the second floor, renovating the second floor. We're putting in a cyber lab, initially a kind of a general studies lab for like, chemistry, general sciences and then there's just a standard computer lab as well. Dave Blanks Okay. Computer lab, cybersecurity lab. And then to general instruction. Okay. Jeff Pierce And then we'll renovate the other floor with other labs over the next 1 to 2 years down there as well. And then once we're done with that one, we'll move to the third, fourth and then fifth floor. Dave Blanks Total of five floors. Jeff Pierce Correct. We got about $40 million that we've got right now, that we're planning out. And we'll take it as far as we go in this dynamic time of, inflation and construction these days.. Dave Blanks Well, everything when we started the Campus Construction Update, it was before Covid, and then we went through Covid and access to materials and inflation and all these other factors like, came in and became such huge players. And it's still... Jeff Pierce It still is. It’s not as dramatic as it and it kind of pops around from roofs at the beginning and during the pandemic was hard to get long lead items. Dozer came back in line. But there will be different things like HVAC systems. Dave Blanks Right. Jeff Pierce That are hard to get long lead items, generators and stuff. And pricing hasn't really came down that much. What has happened is we have adjusted our estimation to account for it to be more conservative, to account for that. Dave Blanks I'm not sure they want to come down on the price to be totally honest. Jeff Pierce No. They don't and it never does. It's amazing. Once you get a rise it will drop down a little bit and then it will level off but it will never go back to where it was before. Dave Blanks Sad but true. Jeff Pierce It’s the nature of the business. Dave Blanks Anything else broad overview you want to you want to mention before we get into, the post office? Jeff Pierce No, we'll go ahead and dive into that. Dave Blanks Sounds good. Jacki, tell us what's happening with the post office. So let's start that way. Jacki McGuire So the post office, we're doing a complete renovation of all of the public facing areas. So a new ...
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    18 分
  • Campus Construction Update, April 22, 2024
    2024/04/22
    Associate Vice Chancellor of Facilities Management Nick Katers and Vice Provost of Academic Program Development and Strategic Initiatives Mike McKenzie join Dave Blanks in studio to discuss the renovation of Wey Hall. TRANSCRIPT Dave Blanks: Hey folks, how's it going? I'm Dave Blanks from University Communications and this is the campus construction update. It's been a moment since I've been in studio, but it's good to be back here. And I'm joined by Nick Katers and Dr. Mike McKenzie. Mike is the... Hey guys, how's it going? I'll say hey to you first. Nick Katers: Good morning. Dr. McKenzie: Good, good to be here. Nick Katers: And how are you? Dave Blanks: I'm great. I'm doing well. So Mike McKenzie, the vice provost of Academic Program Development and Strategic Initiatives, also the designated Academic Affairs representative for the university's space committee, and the designated person from the provost leadership team who's been working with the associate vice chancellor, Mr. Nick Katers, our other guest on the academic needs related to the Wey Hall renovation. That's the topic of the day, is Wey Hall. Nick Katers, associate vice chancellor of Facilities Management. I'll just give a little information about Wey, and then we're going to address some questions about it. So Wey is the home of the Department of Art. It offers more than 100 course sections to approximately 1,400 students. The building's classrooms are used by University College for general education and for first-year seminar courses. I guess, Nick, when was Wey built? Wey's been there for a little while. Nick Katers: Right, yeah, that's exactly why we're talking about this today. So Wey Hall was built in 1976. It was the oldest building that the university had that had never been touched by a holistic renovation, so it was approaching end of life on several critical systems to include the electrical and plumbing. The bathrooms were out of date. The elevator was probably not functional about half the time, and there was no fire suppression or sprinkler system in the building. Now there is a fully functional alarm system, but given all of those faults and the impending loss of some of those critical systems, we judged it was time to give Wey a full comprehensive renovation. Dave Blanks: Right. Yeah. Well that makes sense. Yeah, 50 years is a long time and it's had smaller stuff done, like you said, but not, what was your terminology for it? Comprehensive. Nick Katers: Comprehensive renovation, essentially where we gut the whole thing and start over. Dave Blanks: So that's what we're getting into now and we will talk about that in a little bit, but I understand there have been recent safety concerns about Wey, so if y'all would like to speak to those, maybe? Nick Katers: During spring break, we had to do some destructive testing of the floors between the first and second floor. So we chose to do that where the students weren't there. The contractor ended up drilling some bores through the concrete deck of the second floor, and a couple of pieces of concrete fell. One fell into an unoccupied office at the time, and some other smaller pieces fell onto the ceiling tiles above one of the first floor labs. At no time did any of the concrete fall through an occupied area. Dave Blanks: Yeah. So that was a big concern for people and there were some different storylines going around out there, but thank you for clarifying that. So the renovation currently going on, when did it start? Nick Katers: Well, we've been working on the planning for about two years now, but we really started last summer by closing down the second and third floors. We decided because of a lack of similar type lab and industrial arts classrooms to keep the first floor open for this academic year while we work to find alternative spaces. But for the most part, the renovations are proceeding as scheduled on the second and third floor. The third floor is actually now starting to put new walls up. It's really looking pretty good. Dave Blanks: So was it completely gutted? Nick Katers: The second and third floors have been completely gutted. All the internal walls, all the bathrooms, everything was essentially pulled down so that we could start over. We had to run new electrical, new plumbing, new IT systems, HVAC improvements, fire suppression systems. All of those things are being added. And we're taking, similar to what we did with Sanford, we're taking the old internal elevator and moving it to the outside to be able to buy some of that space back for program area. Dave Blanks: Gotcha. Yeah, it looks cool on Sanford. I like the visual of that. Maybe Mike, I don't know if you could address this, but are faculty and staff still in Wey right now? Dr. McKenzie: So there are classes on that first floor, and those are those studio kind of classes, think your huge kilns and wood shops and metal shops. But the second and third floor are completely vacant, and the offices ...
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    18 分