By Joe Hickman
Published: Jun. 3, 2024 at 7:18 PM CDT|Updated: 19 hours ago
SPRINGFIELD, Mo. (KY3) - Except for summer classes and youth camps, Missouri State University doesn’t have a lot of activity going on in June unless you count the construction work going on around campus.
A brief tour through the streets finds storm water and sidewalk improvements being made and structures being added to a pair of the university’s older academic buildings with the older facilities themselves also getting renovated.
When it comes to finding out what’s going on concerning MSU’s construction projects, there’s a department (and a website) for that.
The website is run by the MSU Planning, Design, and Construction department, which is headed by University Architect and Director Mark Wheeler.
These days he’s keeping very busy.
“We have 193 projects in our office currently,” he said of current and future work. “All of them are smaller than these building projects.”
It may be something like work on an elevator or a roof replacement.
“We have 98 buildings on campus,” Wheeler pointed out. “If you do a new roof every year it would be 98 years before we’d touch that roof again.”
Other current projects include replacing the turf at Allison South Stadium, renovating locker rooms at Hammons Student Center, improvements to the baseball facility, adding an 8,500 square-foot building at the Darr Agricultural Center and a new Autism Center on the West Plains campus.
But on the main campus in Springfield what is noticeable are the two 1970′s-style structures getting some much-needed work and additions.
Blunt Hall, formerly known as Temple Hall and renamed for retiring U.S. Senator Roy Blunt in 2023, was built in 1971 and houses Natural and Applied Sciences including biology, chemistry, geography, and geology.
It’s dark, dank indoor feel includes hallways filled with equipment due to a lack of space.
“The original building is about 120,000 square-feet and we are building a 70,000 square-foot addition,” Wheeler said. “The addition will be almost all research labs and faculty offices. Once this addition is complete we’ll relocate those labs out of the existing building, move them over to the addition and then begin renovation of the existing building. We’ll start some renovation work this summer but most of that will happen once the addition is completed in May of 2025. The renovation part will then be completed by the summer of 2026. Counting both projects we’ll be spending about $120 million which is by far the largest project that we’ve done on campus.”
Kemper Hall was built just a couple of years after Blunt Hall in the 1970′s and as you walk down the hallway of the ground floor and look up, you see exposed wiring and pipes that remind you of just how old the building is. Kemper is the home of the physics, astronomy, materials science, technology and construction management programs and this facility will also be getting a renovation as well as an addition.
“That building is about 70,000 square-feet and there will be a 10,000 square-foot addition there,” Wheeler explained. “The primary anchor to that space is a two-story training lab where we’ll be able to bring in concrete trucks and a spider crane so students will be able to physically build things within that space. That is a $9.6 million project and it will be completed in December of this year.”
The list of future projects includes the Clifton M. Smart III University Advancement Center and the Judith Enyeart Reynolds Arts Center that involved the largest one-time donation in university history.
“This is the most significant building period we’ve had and that’s due to President Smart’s leadership and ability to raise money through Brent Dunn and the Foundation,” Wheeler said. “So there’s a lot of work over the next three years that’s going to be going on at this campus.”
And yes, those supply chain issues that became so well-known during the pandemic are still going on.
“In the post-COVID world we still see significant lead times,” Wheeler said. “Primarily with HVAC and electrical equipment. So we’re ordering stuff now for projects we’ll be doing two years from now. That’s by far the biggest obstacle that we’re having to manage in our current market.”
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