With the early-morning beeping of trucks in reverse, who needs an alarm clock? Not the residents of Wannamaker Dormitory or Edens Quadrangle, they say.
"Everyone in this entire place can hear it," said sophomore Nate Fredrickson, who lives in Edens. "It's pretty bad."
After a summer of starting early in the mornings, some West-Edens Link construction workers have not changed their schedules to meet the University's expectation that construction not begin before 8 a.m., said Judith White, director of the Residential Program Review. Because the University's summer programs began early in the morning, too, workers' schedules did not conflict with those of the program participants.
College students, however, are a different story.
White said her office received a couple of complaints on Tuesday about early morning noise disturbances, but that those were the first concerns that had been directed to her.
"We're really working on getting the word out that it's time to get into the-students-are-back mode," White said. "We're going to have to talk again about the loud noise, but we're not going to promise that [it's going to be totally quiet] before 8 a.m."
She said that between the time the workers arrive-around 7 a.m.-and when they can start construction around 8 a.m., they are preparing for their day: moving trucks but not working with earth-moving equipment.
A number of students complained they had been woken up in the morning by the sound of trucks beeping-few said they had heard actual construction in the past week.
Still, there have been a few reports of louder mornings. At 6:45 a.m. one day last week, sophomore Natalie Thomas and her hallmates in Wannamaker IV were awaken by the incessant pounding of metal against metal, she said.
"It woke everybody up," Thomas said. "It was pretty bad." Since then, she said, things have quieted down.
White said she will continue to emphasize to the contractor and subcontractors that heavy-duty construction should not begin before 8 a.m.
Still, the situation is a catch-22, White said. "Eight in the morning is a bad compromise," she said. "It's late for the construction workers, and early for the students... but it's the most reasonable solution we have."
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