The University of Nevada is set to break ground on a new engineering building but before that happens, it has to demolish eight houses along Evans Avenue. Crews are in the final phase of asbestos abatement, unhooking utilities and salvaging some materials before they tear down the homes.
The four-story building will be 100,114 square-feet and will provide high-tech space for all five of the university's engineering departments. The building will have more than 40 faculty offices, 150 graduate student work stations, more than 40 laboratories, a clean room, large-scale computer lab, a 200-student classroom and the Dean of the College of Engineering's offices.
"I used to be in engineering so it's going to be really cool when it is built. It sucks to see that housing is leaving so people are gonna have less places to stay," Mason Bradley, Senior at UNR said.
The homes were built between the 1930s and 1960s. Bradley lives across the street from the project. He says he helped some friends move out of one of the houses and he's seen the neighborhood change in the last few months, as tenants moved out of each house.
"Basically, just people moving out," Bradley said. "As you can see, people's lawns are dying, so obviously they're not watering their grass. So, it seems like they're getting ready to come through and just tear down all the houses."
Demolition is expected to begin in two to four weeks, followed by the groundbreaking of the engineering building. It is the latest project for the university, which continues to expand.
"They need to expand," Jan Bruce, Evans Ave. resident said. "They need the money from the students coming in. It's a wonderful university and you can't stop progress when it's good progress."
University officials say typical construction issues could happen during the project. Traffic and pedestrian access could be impacted, and noise will likely persist during the demolition and construction.
"Very early in the morning, they started in and I've got people sleeping here with doors open and stuff, so it's already been an issue and it's gonna only get worse," Bruce said.
"Hopefully, they're not up too early in the morning, building, but it's probably just something we'll have to live with for now," Bradley said.
The project's estimated cost is $91.97 million. The state of Nevada will pay $41.5 million of the cost, with the university and donors funding the remaining $50.4 million.
