Eventually, construction at Brigham Young University will do away with all parking on inner campus, said BYU spokesman Paul Richards. Until then, growing pains will continue to make the campus expand outward and upward.
"Part of our plan to solve the traffic, parking and pollution problems is to eventually close inner campus to traffic," Richards said. "That will encourage people to use public transportation. If we close inner campus, that will produce more space to build."As of last year, BYU had 421 permanent buildings, 81 temporary buildings with 7,215,000 permanent square feet and 181,000 temporary square feet. However, Richards said the permanent buildings also include bus shelters, pump houses and hog sheds.
BYU President Rex E. Lee recently addressed the building situation in a speech to BYU faculty.
"Probably the only time in our history when building needs did not occupy a substantial portion of the administration's attention and efforts was in 1875, when we first opened our doors to 29 students in the Lewis Building on Center Street and 300 West," Lee said. "I believe it is literally true that over the entire period since then, my predecessors and I have always had to be concerned with space and building needs."
This year alone, BYU will finish constructing a new Fine Arts Museum, a new Joseph Smith Building to house the College of Religious Education and married and foreign language housing. There are also plans to renovate the Ernest L. Wilkinson Center, the student union, and to build a new science building on a hill just south of the Nichols Building.
According to BYU folklore, BYU President Ernest L. Wilkinson once told the board of trustees that with an enrollment ceiling and the completion of certain buildings the "campus was complete."
"Whether that story was true or apocryphal, the fact is that in just the two decades since the end of the Wilkinson administration, we have added nine new buildings, including 4 major academic buildings, for a total of 1,400,000 net additional square feet," Lee said.
Even with an enrollment ceiling, the campus will continue to need construction, Lee said. Old buildings, like the Joseph Smith Building, will need to be replaced, and other buildings, like the Eyring Science Building and the Harold B. Lee Library, will need to be updated and expanded.
The largest project on campus, however, is the museum of fine arts. Because it is considered an enrichment building that does not generate revenues or fulfill an academic purpose, the museum is being funded entirely by private donations. Part of the $17 million raised for the museum includes an endowment for maintenance.
A new building to house the College of Communications has also been proposed, but not enough funds are available to begin construction.