Construction on the new facility is moving along very quickly.  The east half of the parking lot has already been excavated down about 10 feet (I believe it will be roughly level with Jefferson Ave when completed).  Huge forms for concrete are being constructed along Jefferson Ave and in the upper (west) part of the parking lot.

I'm afraid this may be a real boondoggle.

Why is it a boondoggle?

Will there be a flagpole?  Or a tiara on this one too?

Why is it a boondoggle?

 

It's for the practice field, right? The one the guy who bolted town said he wanted?

 

I'm worried the team won't be competitive, that it will be too hard to keep the momentum from the last two seasons. There's an article on the Enquirer site today which talks about how the Big East might dissolve, leaving the Bearcats without a way to compete with BCS teams. The author was saying if the Big 10 decides to increase its numbers significantly, the other bigguns will likely follow suit, and our only hope would be to get picked up by the ACC.

I think UC is well aware that are in a very bad place if the conferences explode to 4 sixteen team conference which is currently the conventional wisdom - some have even talked about those four conferences leaving the NCAA altogether. UC needs to hold Louisville close and chances are we'll have to become familiar with Memphis again.

So the question is: if this happens, will all the investment in new practice facilities amount to a boondoggle?

 

I'd say so. It won't help UC be competitive, and it won't draw major recruits. (It certainly won't keep Kelly around.) Thus next to no potential for ROI.

 

Orange Bowl, Sugar Bowl...nice while it lasted.

Recruits like quality facilities. I would include practice fields into that mix. So I would say that practice fields should help.

It won't draw them on its own. A competitive team is necessary to go along with the facilities.

And facilities are needed to have a competitive team. The B10 expansion is at least 2 years out. As UC continues its success, they will look more and more appealing to the other big conferences that may be looking to expand.

I hope you're right.

Like I need another reason to dislike the Big Ten and their farm boy schools.

The problem for UC has nothing to do with its actual teams - the market isn't so big that the big four need it (especially when the Big Ten has OSU and the SEC has Kentucky, which both claim part of the Cincy market). OSU won't let it into the Big 10. I don't see the SEC wanting to an urban school north of the Ohio River. A couple years is irrelevant if this whole thing goes down. UC's weak basketball program hurts as well.

The problem for UC has nothing to do with its actual teams - the market isn't so big that the big four need it (especially when the Big Ten has OSU and the SEC has Kentucky, which both claim part of the Cincy market). OSU won't let it into the Big 10. I don't see the SEC wanting to an urban school north of the Ohio River. A couple years is irrelevant if this whole thing goes down. UC's weak basketball program hurts as well.

 

I was factoring this stuff in when I was saying "a competitive team" ... it doesn't matter how good your team is, if you can't get into a BCS bowl you're uncompetitive.

Oh my, up here in Columbus with no cable TV, I have been on a total blackout regarding UC football news. UC really does sounds screwed if things play out as predicted.

You can only gameplan and worry so much.

UC's DAAP building to get facelift

 

By Cliff Peale • [email protected] • November 4, 2010

 

 

Hailed when it opened in 1996 as an architectural beacon for the University of Cincinnati campus, the DAAP building at UC is about to get a $20 million facelift.

 

The $35 million building at Clifton Avenue and Martin Luther King Drive is leaking in several spots and needs repairs before the damage gets worse.

 

http://news.cincinnati.com/article/20101104/NEWS01/11050323/DAAP-getting-facelift

Seems like one of those articles where the reporter interviewed someone, but had no idea what they were talking about, and tried to write the piece anyway (just like when the reporter wrote that queen city square would be built from the top down and the building would be jacked up one floor at a time). 

 

The best i can understand, they are reclading the building with aluminum panels, right?  What a welcome sight that will be.

Hailed when it opened in 1996 as an architectural beacon for the University of Cincinnati campus, the DAAP building at UC is about to get a $20 million facelift.

 

Hailed?  I WISH the building was hailed...on.

Yeah, they're just recladding it with aluminum panels.  They will be the exact same colors. 

 

There's actually a sculptural type full-scale mock-up on the lawn to the north of the building, along MLK.  It has a few different options the school was considering to use as re-cladding.

The original facade was to be ceramic tile (furthering Eisenman's grid leanings) but that was value engineered out.  The new cladding will be a big step forward for comfort in the building whereas the AC wont have to always run to pull all the moisture out of the air. 

 

Interesting that they are going with the same (often criticized) colors. (for the record the colors really grow on you after 6 years, and you might even appreciate- while some buildings influence the ambiance of what is designed with in them... i never felt imposed upon by the subtle shades blue, green, and pink... just sayin)

I remember last winter Professor Tilman telling our studio about this and at the time I was under the impression that it would not be the same colors once it was reclad. I'm a little upset this isn't the case as I feel that the pastel color scheme is by far the worst part of the building design wise. That and the BS use of 'grids' making every surface look like someone drew haphazard lines on a plane in Sketchup and used the push/pull tool aimlessly then insisted it was all part of some grander scheme. Oh well, at least it won't look like its decaying from the corner of MLK and Clifton once it is reclad. That shall be a huge improvement over the mold-covered facade we have to look at right now.

I remember last winter Professor Tilman telling our studio about this and at the time I was under the impression that it would not be the same colors once it was reclad. I'm a little upset this isn't the case as I feel that the pastel color scheme is by far the worst part of the building design wise. That and the BS use of 'grids' making every surface look like someone drew haphazard lines on a plane in Sketchup and used the push/pull tool aimlessly then insisted it was all part of some grander scheme. Oh well, at least it won't look like its decaying from the corner of MLK and Clifton once it is reclad. That shall be a huge improvement over the mold-covered facade we have to look at right now.

 

All of Eisenman's work looks like this. Crazy ass shapes. He is the MAIN reason that, as a planner, I think that architecture students need to realize that while architecture is art, it is also meant to be FUNCTIONAL. A lot of starchitects seem to snub their noses at this notion, and design buildings in the "high art" manner. If you look at DAAP, you can tell that the people were a second thought. There is no main entrance, the bathrooms are horribly lit and poorly place, there are a lot of small rooms and many with no windows.

^I completely agree that architecture must first be functional and after that an art form. Combining these two aspects is what creates truly successful architecture in my opinion which is why I've never been a fan of Eisenman. Some of his work is a lot better than DAAP, but for the most part it's all garbage in my opinion. My roommate is a huge fan of his (don't really know why) and we've gotten into many arguments over the 'success' of DAAP's design. He likes it for all the reasons I don't like it, but to each his own I suppose. But I'm glad that at the very least something is being done to help with the leaking problem.

That and the BS use of 'grids' making every surface look like someone drew haphazard lines on a plane in Sketchup and used the push/pull tool aimlessly then insisted it was all part of some grander scheme.

 

Supposedly Mike McInturf can tell you what nearly every line, color change, and shape means.  However, after spending 6 years in and out of that building, and graduating from the architecture program there, I certainly never figured it out.  The only real move that I ever noticed (and only after someone else brought it up, might have been David Niland) was that as the building swings around its arc from east to west, it moves from leaning outward to leaning inward.  You can see this as the vertical structures become exposed near the west end of the building outside, while the opposite happens inside along the grand staircase.  Unfortunately, the excessively convoluted geometries and colors only muddle whatever broader strokes were made with the design. 

 

If you have to go to a lecture to figure out what the design of a building means, then the design is a failure. 

 

It really is the worst kind of starchitecture.  Whimsy and risk taking can be great things, especially when they result in spaces that are awe-inspiring and great to inhabit.  Such is not the case with the likes of Eisenman or Gehry.  It's all about artistic form which only serves to pump up the ego of the designer and the client, users be damned.  Had the Aronoff building not needed a full-time surveyor for the duration of construction, or the mountains of special steel framing and drywall and EIFS joints to fit the crazy geometry, they could've spent the money on some durable cladding instead.  I never had the chance to see it while under construction, but I understand that with just the steel superstructure and floor plates in place the spaces were much more open and interesting.  They filled it with so much fluff that it's pretty thoroughly unpleasant and harsh, not to mention confusing. 

 

EIFS issues aside, I'm disappointed that UC never bothered to even TRY repairing or cleaning the exterior.  A good soapy pressure washing can go a long way to clean things up while trying to figure out how to fix everything else.  Even with integral color on the stucco coating, they could've just bit the bullet and repainted the worst stained parts.  It is the first building you see when coming from I-75 after all, which is the way most people visiting campus for the first time come.

^I respectfully disagree, per your point

"if you have to go to a lecture to figure out what the design of a building means, then the design is a failure"

 

Many great very valuable projects and buildings necessitate intense study to fully appreciate them. The writings and drawings of the DAAP project are numerous, not extremely long, and very accessible.

This is not the way that I personally design but for a school of architecture it is of value.  Consider that you as a student you can stand in the atrias and track the rotation of identical rectilinear volumes of equal size intersecting and rotating on 3 distinct levels.  It could have been done more clearly, yes, but overall it allows on the opportunity to visualize massing and volume in a building where students are struggling to do that every day.

Think of it from the perspective of someone in planning: It makes no sense as a functional educational space. The lighting is poor, rooms crunched and some windowless. The building FAILS at a basic level because it functions as a useful space so horribly.

You have no argument from me that many requisite functional spaces of the building fail to perform their task.

 

I was merely trying to note that in a building for designers, the requisite spaces are not merely that of a typical campus building, and that DAAP has merit outside of its failures (in classrooms, overall size, and light quality) for those in who are visualizing design.

Think of it from digital, industrial, art composition, and sculptural design perspectives... 

The DAAP building itself is didactic, as a design school.  Remember that before the addition was there, DAA consisted of 3 buildings that had little or no public/common space.  The addition does a great job of linking the three older buildings and providing critique and public space. 

^That it definitely does do. The only problem with the grand stair critique space is the lack of large flat surfaces to place things on but this can easily be negated by using the rolling pinup boards they have so I don't see this as a huge problem. The best space in the building is definitely the Cafe in my opinion and in terms of bringing the different parts of the building together into a common space, DAAP does work, but that's about the only thing it does successfully.

I think DAAP would be substantially improved if they were just allowed to repaint the exterior and interior with a different color scheme. That crossed with the fluorescent lighting makes it almost impossible for me to work in there. Sterile is the word.

Initially I wasn't a fan of the Miami Vice color scheme that the DAAP building has, but after having a class in the auditorium this quarter its kind of growing on me. That's not to say it couldn't look a lot nicer though.

Wow, big money for a project like that.

 

UC law school builds on services

 

By Cliff Peale • [email protected] • January 29, 2011

 

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A new law school building on a high-profile corner at the University of Cincinnati will have to wait until UC raises up to half of the more than $60 million required.

 

Building on the site of the existing college at Clifton Avenue and Calhoun Street will mean moving the College of Law to another location for two years.

 

But until that project gets started, the school is moving ahead with a series of services designed to expand its student base beyond traditional students in their 20s seeking a law degree.

 

One new program is a law clinic where students can serve small companies and non-profits, with the first batch of clients coming to UC in early February.

 

Another is a four-week summer training program targeting lawyers in China. Starting this year probably with fewer than 20 students, the Institute for the Global Practice of Law will cost $4,000, Dean Lou Bilionis said.

 

 

More at http://news.cincinnati.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/AB/20110129/NEWS0102/101300301/

 

  So, the existing building, which is "decades" old, will be demolished and replaced with another one of the same size?

 

  Seems like such a waste. "This is a 50 year decision," they say, but the old one didn't even last 50 years.  :-(

Higher tuition rates no doubt.

It's the business of education... somehow, taking on a new building to replace one that is ... 30 or so years old?

 

Can anyone log into the UC Space Management System and pull up the build date?

http://www.law.uc.edu/sites/default/files/Overview1833-1983_byRutter&Wilson.pdf

 

Looks like construction was 1980-1982 with dedication in 1983.  Scroll through to see the images of the 1925 building being demolished, and shed a little tear...

The original building is still there. The construction done in 1982/83 was an addition that encircled the original building. The facility was completely renovated at that time but because of the addition and renovation, the layout of the building is very disjointed and you will notice that if you are inside the building. Also, with the old building still there, it limits some of the things they could do technology wise because of the thick walls of the old structure.

 

This new law school has been on the drawing board for at least 10 years now and is not going to take off anytime soon. I will be surprised if it breaks ground sometime in the next 5 years given the capital requirements involved.

Case Western Law might consider a new facility in the next decade but the capital campaign hasn't started yet, and they don't need it as badly as UC seems to, despite being a significantly bigger school in terms of class size.

I met the guy who designed UC's College of Law once when I was a young kid.  He talked to me about architecture for a few solid hours.  He also designed the Geo-Phys Building, and you can see a lot of similarities between the two.

 

It's a shame the Law Building is only going to last 30-40 some years.  What's a bigger shame is Wilson Auditorium, further down on Clifton.  UC has had their eye on tearing that down for awhile, in order to build a new consolidated building for Arts & Sciences.  I'd imagine it goes before Law does.

Maybe, but they have to raise a ton of money for the A&S building. I'd bet the Law School (unless the peak law education idea turns about to be true and starts to bite soon) can raise the money more quickly than the disparate folks in A&S.

60 Million seems like a really big $ amount. Akron is doing a 95,000 sq. ft. law building for 29 Million.

Marquette finished their new law facility, over 205,000 Sq. Ft. original estimates were 80 Million.

Private schools do design - build which can be very cost efficient, Opus did that project.

UC current building isn't that big is it, any guesses.

Could University of Cincinnati's law school move to Banks?

Councilman Charlie Winburn pitches $65M project

Premium content from Business Courier by Lucy May and Dan Monk, Senior Staff Reporters

Date: Friday, April 13, 2012, 6:00am EDT

 

The University of Cincinnati    is being lobbied to move its College of Law to the downtown riverfront.

 

Cincinnati Councilman Charlie Winburn has worked since February to line up $25 million in city incentives to lure the nation’s fourth-oldest law school to a site at the Banks development, at Vine and Second streets. The move would be part of an effort that would require raising another $40 million in private funds. Winburn said the Banks location would place roughly 400 law students and three dozen professors at the center of the Tri-State’s legal community and give the university far greater regional exposure.

 

UC President Gregory Williams called the idea “thought-provoking and appreciated” but said he’ll continue to pursue the school’s previously announced plan to build a new law school on UC’s Uptown campus.

The advantage of the Law School moving to The Banks is that UC could reclaim that prime corner space for other purposes. It could be used for an new building for A&S, or for new dorms allowing UC to shut down some of the older ones*.  It could be also be used for another University Park/USquare type of development, although it would be terrible timing to build that right now.

 

 

*It's been several years since UC shut down Morgens & Scioto for renovation, and I haven't heard anything about whether they'll ever be able to reopen them.  UC was planning to shut down Calhoun and Siddall for renovation after Morgens & Scioto opened back up, but obviously that hasn't happened yet. Has anyone heard any actual updates?

^One opens next year, the other the year after. They are on the list of available dorms for incoming freshman this upcoming school year. It was one of the choices my younger brother pondered before settling on Siddall.

*It's been several years since UC shut down Morgens & Scioto for renovation, and I haven't heard anything about whether they'll ever be able to reopen them.  UC was planning to shut down Calhoun and Siddall for renovation after Morgens & Scioto opened back up, but obviously that hasn't happened yet. Has anyone heard any actual updates?

 

Morgens was supposed to basically receive a cosmetic face lift; however, they discovered mold in just about every square inch of living space so they had to do more work than originally thought.  Not sure about Scioto.

Anyone know if either of those buildings are recieving any kind of exterior facelift? They are both eastern-european housing block scary.

This was the original plan, not sure if UC ever changed direction though....