WMU tells community its early plans for East Campus

After years of discussion, plans for what could become of the buildings that comprise Western Michigan University’s historic East Campus look like they are finally coming together.    
       
Under preliminary plans announced by WMU officials Wednesday, Feb. 1, the centerpiece of the redevelopment would be the transformation of East Hall, built in 1904, into a boutique hotel, a high-end, less than 100-room facility that would be geared toward weddings, conferences and other professional uses. 

North Hall, built in 1925, would be turned into residential units and 20,000 square feet of the Speech and Hearing Building, opened in 1939, would be renovated into office space, according to the plans.

"We want to focus on the adaptive reuse of these historic buildings," Bob Miller, associate vice president for community outreach at WMU, told about 50 people gathered for the announcement at the university’s Walwood Hall.

After an extensive national search process, the university hired Dearborn-based KDC Real Estate Development and Investments to handle the master planning of the project, estimated at between $55 million and $60 million. 

The project will be financed by private dollars, Miller said, with WMU entering into a yet-to-be designed agreement that would hand over ownership of the buildings to developers for a period of time, but ensure that after that timeframe, the buildings would be again owned by the university. The development of each of the buildings would stand on their own, he said, each one a unique project.

No one is buffing their ceremonial first dig shovels yet, however.

The cutting of Brownfield and other development tax credits and grants by Gov. Rick Snyder’s administration has meant that WMU and KDC still don’t know what level of support for the project they can muster out of Lansing.

Although Kalamazoo city officials and the area’s state house and senate contingent have been "incredibly supportive" of the project, Miller said, there are still many details that need to be hashed-out before firm plans can be drawn up.

"We’re just waiting on proposals from the state," said Randy Doran, senior vice president and partner with KDC, and a 1983 WMU grad. "We’re at a point now where we can start to move, but we need to know what incentives we might be able to get."

Said Miller, "It’s a very, very difficult project to make final sense out of given the challenges we are facing."

Still, Doran and Miller were excited about the prospects for the project and what it could mean for WMU and the community at large. Boutique hotels have gained popularity since the 1980s, and the East Hall redevelopment would likely include a health club in the building’s gymnasium area, an atrium and other high-end amenities, Doran said.

A parking ramp would be built in an area adjacent to East Hall and extensive landscaping would be installed on the former WMU football practice fields just east of the campus at the bottom of Prospect Hill.

Efforts would be made to keep as much of the historic architecture of the buildings as possible, most notably at East Hall, which was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1978. All of East Campus was placed on the list in 1990.

The WMU archives, currently housed in East Hall, would be moved to another location, Miller said.

"This is the home of the university," Doran said. "We are not going to forget that."

Writer: Chris Killian, For Second Wave
Source: WMU Townhall Meeting