Final 10-year campus plan released

Members of the Borough Council have said that more community input is necessary before certain aspects of the plan receive approval from the Borough.

Divisions in town-gown interests

Sustaining strong community relations was one of the five guiding principles for the two-year planning effort led by Executive Vice President Mark Burstein, Vice President for Facilities Michael McKay and New York design firm Beyer Blinder Belle Architects & Planners LLP, according to the brochure.

Community input into the plan has been very limited so far, however, Borough Council members Andrew Koontz and Roger Martindell said.

“To date, none of my concerns [about the plan] have been addressed,” Koontz said.

Nevertheless, Burstein and Durkee said the plan incorporates many recommendations made by town residents.

Yet the Borough Council has control over zoning laws that greatly affect the plan’s implementation. “In my view, far too many questions remain outstanding for Borough Council to take action on the [zoning] changes needed to implement this plan,” Koontz said. The main concern is that the interests of the community are not adequately reflected in the plan.

The relocation of the Dinky would inconvenience local residents and weaken the town-gown connection, Koontz said, adding that “to move the Dinky further away from Princeton’s downtown for the convenience of automobile drivers [attending events at McCarter and Berlind theatres] represents wrong-headed policy in this day of escalating gas prices and environmental concerns.”

Martindell said he was “not convinced” the Dinky should be moved south. “To move it south reduces its accessibility to the downtown and is expensive without producing compensating benefits,” he said.

The University’s plan for the Arts Neighborhood and the Dinky’s relocation would destroy a “vital town-gown link,” by moving Wawa to a location that is “convenient for students but much less convenient for town residents,” Koontz said.

In response to Koontz’s and Martindell’s comments, Durkee and Burstein stated that the development of the plan involved community input at every stage and that many of its recommendations respond specifically to issues raised by town residents.

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“I don’t know of any campus-planning process at any other university that had as much ongoing community input as we benefited from in preparing this plan,” Durkee said. “Many comments and concerns from the community are reflected in the plan,” he added, citing the plan’s recommendations to improve bike and pedestrian circulation and the decision to designate FitzRandolph Road as the eastern border of campus as examples.

The administrators who helped develop the plan met frequently with members of the community and had conversations with the Planning Board, Borough Council and Township Committee at two “well-attended” open houses, Durkee said.

Durkee also refuted Koontz’s and Martindell’s claims regarding the relocation of the Dinky. While some members of the Borough community expressed concerns about moving the Dinky, others “strongly supported” the creation of the Arts and Transit Neighborhood, Durkee said.

Martindell raised concerns about the financial ramifications of the plan. In an interview with The Daily Princetonian in April of last year, Koontz expressed similar sentiments about the University’s “aggressive acquisition of new properties,” explaining that “expanding the Arts Neighborhood will mean ... more property that is currently on the tax rolls” will become property for “educational purposes” and thus cannot contribute tax revenue to the Borough.

Additionally, as the Borough loses tax revenue, its budget becomes more reliant on University contributions. It is possible that the Borough Council would require the University to consider increasing its annual financial contribution to the Borough before approving the campus plan. This measure would provide relief to Princeton taxpayers who “pay far more than they would if the University were not tax exempt,” Martindell said.

In recent years, the University’s voluntary financial contribution to the Borough has “dramatically increased,” Durkee said, rising from $1 million two years ago to about $1.1 million this year. The University has made other contributions that have reduced the taxpayers’ burden, including half-million dollar donations to the public schools and public library, Durkee added.

“While the campus plan is likely to provide a number of non-financial benefits to the Borough, I believe it also is likely to have a net financial benefit because of the additional taxes and the additional contribution it will generate,” Durkee said.

What’s in the 10-year plan?

The 10-year plan’s main elements include the creation of an Arts and Transit Neighborhood on the west side of campus, the relocation of Wawa and the Dinky station, the revamping of the shuttle system and the construction of new buildings for chemistry, neuroscience and psychology.

“We hope to accomplish as many of the recommendations as possible,” Durkee said, adding that the completion of many of the ideas it lays out will depend on fundraising or getting municipal approvals.

Each part of the plan is of equal importance, President Tilghman said. “Asking what part of the plan is most important is like asking me to choose among my children,” she said.

Burstein, however, highlighted three areas of the plan as being “most important”: integrating sustainability into all aspects of the plan, improving housing for graduate students, faculty and staff, and major building projects, which include the creation of the Arts and Transit Neighborhood and the reinforcement of the science neighborhood.

“These changes will have impact on the campus for many, many years to come,” Burstein said.

Associate University Architect for Planning Natalie Shivers explained that the plan will address sustainability efforts and also include landscape restoration and expansion of the landscape network to the areas of growth, traffic mitigation, and responsible management of parking supply and demand.

Large projects in the plan are often dependent on smaller changes, Durkee said. “For example, to receive approval for new buildings for neuroscience and psychology, the University must have enough parking for new employees who might work in those buildings,” Durkee said.

Financial support for the plan

The fate of the Campus Plan is closely linked to the University’s Aspire capital campaign, which aims to raise $1.75 billion in the next five years. The two were developed in conjunction specifically so that each plan could inform the other, Durkee said.

On the one hand, the success of the capital campaign is a first step for the plan. “[The Aspire] campaign is critical to our being able to achieve everything that is in the plan,” Tilghman said.

“The capital plan includes a number of projects which need support from the greater University community to be implemented,” Burstein explained. “We hope this support will come from the capital campaign.”

The future of Princeton planning

Far from resting easy after the current campus plan is completed, the University will most likely start a new planning effort in 10 to 12 years, Burstein said.

“While this is a 10-year plan, it also establishes a framework for thinking about planning issues beyond the next 10 years,” Durkee said.

The University has engaged in similar planning efforts for the past century. The most recent 1996 master plan by Boston architecture firm Machado and Silvetti Associates is “almost completely built out,” Shivers said.

The finalized plan will be published as a 180-page book later this month. From Feb. 25 to 29, Firestone Library will host an exhibit with maps and a campus model to show the plan to the public.