Getting Better All the Time

At press time, campus roads were a hodgepodge of orange cones, dusty digging vehicles, and neon-clad traffic-directing construction workers. Renovations are plentiful. Here’s an update on two of the projects:

The new vision for the West Union building is to return it to its former glory as the center of student life. So, the reopened venue will be a state-of-the-art dining center that includes a multi-story glass façade that looks out onto Kilgo Quad. The demolition phase is estimated to run through February 2014; construction is expected to run until early 2016. That means more than 110,000 square feet in the eighty-year-old building will undergo change. In the meantime, students will be able to eat at the new Events Pavilion, next to the Bryan Center.

Faux Duke Stone panels went up on the construction fence surrounding the Rubenstein Library and the West Campus Union as part of the latest phase of the Perkins Project, the transformation of Duke’s West Campus libraries. Although the interior demolition is noisy, the reading room, on the other side of the building, isn’t greatly affected. Still, researchers can get foam earplugs if necessary.