Thursday, April 28, 2005

Cambridge, Massachusetts —Harvard University planners met with the Agassiz Neighborhood Council to update the community about Harvard’s construction and expansion plans in the neighborhood on April 26, the Harvard Crimson reported today. The two major topics discussed were the Northwest Science Building, which is currently under construction on Oxford Street, and the expansion of the Harvard Law School. According to the Crimson, Harvard officials outnumbered the number of community members present at the meeting.

The plans for law school expansion are still unfinished, the Crimson reported. The director of community relations at Harvard, Thomas Lucey, said that Wyeth Hall may be demolished. According to the Law School website, Wyeth Hall is “the most popular dormitory at Harvard Law School”. It is adjacent to the Berkman Center for Internet and Society on Massachusetts Avenue, just south of Three Aces pizzeria.

The Crimson also noted that Tom Murray, the project manager for the Northwest Science Building, was slated for completion by May of 2007, with landscaping completed the following spring.

A visit to the science building site by Wikinews reporter Pingswept last week verified that the pouring of cement had begun. Four large cranes had been brought to the site; one of them was being used with a clamshell attachment twice the height of a grown man to dig a deep trench. The truck “wheel wash” station marked on the site plan was operational, in the form of a man with a pressure washer, though in this reporter’s brief observations, more windshields were washed than dirty tires.