Students have been dealing with construction in Harbor Hall for the entire semester. The project should be complete by the beginning of spring semester.
Harbor Hall is home to the department of verbal and visual arts, where students rely heavily on reliable, up-to-date technology and materials. Graphic design students – juniors and seniors chosen by faculty members – are limited to just one classroom.
The renovation project started in the Fall semester to construct a new, updated space for students.
The university acquired the building in 2011, which was originally the Salvador Dali Museum. The structure’s empty gallery space will be constructed into classrooms and design studios.
Sophomore Gaby Mena, 20, said the noise from Harbor Hall’s renovation disrupted her quiet drawing class. Mena said construction workers walked in the middle of a figure-drawing class with a nude model. “I just thought, how disrespectful,” she said.
Jennifer Livaudais, 20, is a senior in the graphic design program. She said the construction in Harbor Hall has become inconvenient for her and her classmates.
“It’s just noisy,” Livaudais said. “And sometimes these giant trash collectors come and block portions of the parking lot and take up several spots so you can’t park. It makes navigating the area difficult and unsafe.”
The project’s superintendent Tom Takacs from Willis Smith Construction said the new classrooms will be ready for the spring semester. However, the auditorium, with electrical data ports in each seat, and community room is expected to take longer.
Graduating students like graphic design senior Erin Morgan, 21, said she is disappointed.
“We were told it was going to be completed by the Fall semester,” Morgan said. “Instead they widened the g### sidewalks along Poynter Park.”
According to Morgan, the graphic design classroom is limited to three wall plugs and one student decided to buy power strips so that others could charge their laptops.
Coordinator of the graphic design program John Stanko has been with the university for three years and has hoped for the expansion since he started.
“We’d rather them do it right, than do it fast,” said Stanko, referring to the faculty’s opinion on the work.
According to Stanko, the project will allow for more students to be accepted into the program. Last year, 60 students applied to the graphic design program, but only 18 seats were available because of limited building space.
There major change in the architectural plans moved construction to start in the fall instead of summer.
“The university is never a finite physical plan,” said USF St. Petersburg’s construction project manager James Grant. “It’s one that changes with time.”
