The muddy ruts, puddles and broken tree limbs littering the landscape of one of the last remaining undeveloped plots of land on Chestnut Ridge Road in Amherst aren't just the aftermath of the "October Surprise."
American Campus Communities, the Texas-based company that also manages the University Village at Sweethome, recently bulldozed the property and plans to open the doors to a new student housing complex in the fall of 2008.
The plan
Construction of the 552-bed complex is anticipated to begin in early 2007, and leasing will begin the following fall. The site plan calls for eleven residential buildings with a total of 196 units. Thirty-two units are efficiencies, 16 are one-bedroom, 44 are two-bedrooms and the remaining 104 units contain four-bedrooms.
Each residence will have its own exterior entry, and the buildings with two- and four-bedroom layouts will be three-story town homes. The unique layout places the living room, kitchen and guest bath on the ground floor and the bedrooms, each with a private bath, on the second and third floors. The two-bedroom units will have one bedroom on each upper floor, while the four-bedroom units will have two per upper floor.
The town house configuration was chosen to eliminate the noise created from next door neighbors in traditional apartment layouts, which are side by side.
"The biggest complaint from students is the noise," said Bill Bayless, CEO of American Campus Communities. "This way the only noise is from your own roommates."
All of the parking, planned to be 575 spaces, frames the perimeter of the site.
An 8,500 square foot community center, placed at the entrance of the complex, is planned to boast many of the same amenities as the University Village at Sweethome - recreation and TV lounges as well as a fitness center.
A pre-existing two-and-a-half acre pond will remain on the site and 1,000 trees and shrubs will be added to the landscape.
Community concerns
Some area residents have doubts about the project, and are afraid there hasn't been enough preparation time.
"A few more months waiting is better than flying to bulldoze," said Cam Hill, president of the Willow Ridge Civic Association.
"Amherst is a swamp, by the way," Hill added.
According to Hill, the site was last inspected in 2001. It was not classified as Federal wetlands at the time, but a five-year deadline was set for Oct. 2, 2006, at which time the status would be reevaluated. The weekend before that deadline arrived, the land was bulldozed for the student housing project, despite any questions of its stability.
The sustainability of the area - including the existing sewage and storm drainage systems - is still in question, according to Hill.
"What does all that blacktop do to all the other problems we're having in Amherst?" Hill asked. "There's already flooding in the sewers."
So far ACC has done nothing illegal to obtain or develop the land on Chestnut Ridge, Bayless said, and there are no jurisdictional wetlands on the site itself.
Four informational meetings were held to give community members a chance to learn of the proposed student housing and voice any concerns.
"Attendance was good, but not great," Bayless said.
During the meetings the community was given the power to select the roof design of the buildings. They eagerly accepted the design of pitched roofs, which required a special use permit, over flat roofs, which did not. The idea was that the pitched roofs would give the buildings more of a residential feel.
"We always want to be a good neighbor," Bayless said.
In addition to environmental concerns, local residents are also worried about the volume of police calls that the University Village at Sweethome has generated since its doors opened in the spring of 2005, fearing that the new complexes will bring increased crime to the area.
"There have been 183 police calls since it opened," Hill said. "For Amherst, that's kind of a lot."
Hill and other members of the WRCA also worry about the future. They said that if UB develops more on-campus student housing, the new apartments would be rendered unnecessary.
"What becomes of the piece of property then?" Hill asked. "Who fills it, people coming from prison?"
Home, Sweethome
Paul Wolosz, a senior psychology major who currently lives in the University Village at Sweethome, said that the crime level, if anything, is transparent.
"The do have cops patrolling the place," Wolosz said.
His only complaint is the noise level.
"It's noisy on the weekends, especially Friday and Saturday nights," Wolosz said, which poses a problem if he has to get up early to work on a Saturday.
"I think the big problem is that kids treat this place like the dorms, and it isn't," said Nicholas Fiske, a senior English major who also lives in the University Village. "It's an actual apartment complex, where you have to act like a human being, and a lot of kids can't handle that."
The amenities that Sweethome offers - the private bathrooms, the fitness center, a movie theater and the shuttle service - make it one of the best housing options in Fiske's mind, despite any claims about the excessive police calls.
"It's definitely no worse than the (University) Heights," Fiske said, "And I feel a lot safer here."
Fiske has had no problems living in the apartments - other than recurring vandalism in the stairwell - and doesn't feel the area is negatively affected by their presence.
"There are already a ton of complexes in the area, and it's been relatively calm so far," Fiske said.
Looking ahead
For student housing issues, Hill and the WRCA look to UB for answers.
"UB is the 800 pound gorilla in the room, as far as Amherst is concerned," Hill said.
A master plan, which includes new on-campus student housing, has yet to be developed by UB.
"We're forming a committee to consider additional housing," said Joseph Krakowiak, the director of University Residence Halls and Apartments.
"The campus wants to grow by over 3,000 students in 2010," Krakowiak said.
While this enrollment goal would be better realized with more housing, new on-campus housing projects could take years to actualize.
"When you build something, you have to think about today and tomorrow," Krakowiak said. "Sweethome, the street itself, could become a major off-campus housing street, and it wasn't designed for that."
New housing not only involves the residential buildings, Krakowiak said, but an infrastructure to support them as well. Sidewalks and proximity to services such as grocery stores and laundromats need to be considered, so that residents don't necessarily have to drive.
Dennis Black, vice president of Student Affairs, stated that students who live on campus continue to be more involved in campus life than their off-campus peers, and they also get better grades and stay longer. With this in mind, Black said that the university has a primary focus for creating more housing for students on both North and South Campuses.
There was a past understanding, Black said, between the university and the town of Amherst that the land east of the I-990 would be developed in different ways but the other side would remain residential. Black's concern is that placing student housing on the west side of I-990 will create a student neighborhood in the future.
"You run the risk in the next 20 years of converting the Chestnut Ridge Road area into the next University Heights," Black said.
Amidst negative feedback from the community, ACC remains firm and plans to go ahead with the construction.
"We have a great deal of respect for SUNY Buffalo and its on-campus housing," Bayless said. "We hope to provide quality off-campus alternative housing that is also academically oriented."
