UIC master plan calls for more than $1B of construction over 10 years

The University of Illinois at Chicago will spend more than $1 billion to construct nine new buildings and retool public infrastructure across campus during the next decade, according to the latest draft of a master plan released by the university.

That’s just the first phase of a five-part plan, which foresees dozens of projects including an “entertainment district,” a rebuilt soccer stadium and a new freshman center, according to the Chicago Sun-Times.

The master plan identifies 25 “near-term priority projects” and another 17 long-term initiatives spread between the university’s west campus, which overlaps the Illinois Medical District, and its east campus, which lines Halsted Street from 14th Place to the Eisenhower Expressway.

University leaders also envision a renovated Polk CTA Pink Line station and a narrower Halsted Street that adds space for cyclists and pedestrians.

The expansion will help the university reach its goal of boosting enrollment from 32,000 students to 35,000, chancellor Michael Amiridis told the Sun-Times. Amiridis said the university would fund the work through a roughly even mix of public-private partnerships, bonds, state financing and philanthropy.

The Near West Side campus, which opened in 1965, is not the city’s only institution of higher learning pursuing big projects. Loyola University revealed plans in October to build a new 402-bed dorm building on its Rogers Park campus, and the University of Chicago broke ground on a four-tower dorm complex in Woodlawn. [Chicago Sun-Times] — Alex Nitkin