As I read The Daily Tar Heel on my daily trek from South Campus to class, I notice two themes pervade the paper: state budget cuts for the University and students getting fed up with the never-ending campus construction and the Master Plan.
Students wake to the sounds of jackhammers and construction vehicles. Historic structures such as the Naval Armory are slated for demolition. If we allow them to demolish that building, what's next? Destroying the Old Well to make a pay parking lot for visitors to Franklin Street? Or how about tearing down Old East for a campus Internet cafe?
While it is admirable that the University is trying to make life better, the University has forsaken the students of today. The campus aesthetics that led me to choose Chapel Hill from out of state are being traded for construction barrels and temporary fences.
The beautiful brick sidewalks, the stone walls and even the very lawn of Polk Place have all been marred by the cheap spray paint of construction crews tracking the locations of wiring and plumbing.
All of this while the University is talking about cutting student services and raising tuition because of budget problems. This construction costs a great deal of money, and yet it stretches one end of the campus to the other in a time of economic turmoil and budget shortfalls.
Granted much of this construction is paid for by private gifts and higher education bonds, but wouldn't this money better serve the University community by keeping star members of the faculty and luring new faculty from other competing universities by raising salaries and resources for research?
If a temporary moratorium on new construction was enforced and the money diverted to maintaining the academic climate and aesthetic value of campus, far less would be needed to accomplish this, tuition could actually stop going up, and the budget problems might not be as bad as they seem.
Brian Strang
Freshman
Political Science
The length rule was waived.
