A vital campus revitalization

Duke University isn’t what it used to be, and that’s fantastic for us.

The Duke University that welcomes its wide-eyed incoming freshman, its antsy transfer students hoping that they’ve landed in the right spot, its returners rededicating to another semester of work and play, its professors and laborers seeking something—anything—new, is not the deconstructed Duke University of 2016, a campus which lay in pieces on the ground.

Rather, it is a campus revitalized; the Duke crane is no longer its focal point, nor its microcosm. Today, it is a renovated football stadium. A reopened and ever-exquisite chapel. An idyllic—and quiet—Kilgo Quad. A wellness center and basketball cathedral almost complete, both on-track to finish when expected, and a victory for Title IX with the emergence of a softball program and its very own field. A bridge, a Bryan Center without an Au Bon Pain and, behold, a West Union.

And what a West Union it is. Its architects toyed with the conventional modernism implemented in other construction projects (which Duke students have coined as part of the “glass-box campus”), seamlessly blending the woodwork of the old with the steelwork and glasswork of the new. The arching, antique roof of the previous West Union was partially preserved, paying homage to the foundation of the University, with the remaining ceiling allowing for sunlight to pour in, and for the Duke community to see toward the sky. On September 2, West Union will officially open: a glass-and-wood, opened box, accented with greenery throughout.

With the addition of West Union’s gourmet eating options, totaling 59 options for students using meal points, Duke’s food reigns supreme among all. Construction-less and delicious, it’s a hell of a time to be a Duke student.

This shift in attitude from the University has been long overdue. For some time in between the construction of three new freshman dorms in 1994, there had been a lull in on-campus improvement. The money, for some reason, wasn’t going toward undergraduate experience, a characteristic upon which Duke usually prides itself. During that time, the University dealt with increased apathy due to inaction across the spectrum, from failure to address student and alumni concerns to failures to protect its students and athletes, as in various cases—and miss-cases—of sexual assault. Only about 15 years later, when the University decided to begin renovating and creating, was the reason for the stockpile of funding revealed.

Hundreds of millions of dollars were poured into these various projects, and I couldn’t be happier with the use of the school’s funding. Duke is a business reliant upon the satisfaction of its customers—us. And Duke, specifically, is a university reliant upon its campus; an environment without the attraction of a major U.S. city, but with all of the allure of a major American university. Duke decided to outdo everyone else, placing a significant investment toward undergraduate and on-campus life. It banked on belief that the foundations of the school, Duke basketball, the Chapel, its elite academic and research prowess and its size and scope, would benefit from a better East and West Campus.

It must be mentioned that Duke has not ignored its encompassing city of Durham, which has overgone a transformation in the past decade, in large part to aid from the Duke community. “Dirty Durm” is now an ironic moniker, as the gentrification of the city has attracted trendy businesses and curious people, as well as a new sense of city-wide pride and forward thinking. As is a problem in most gentrifying cities, Durham’s poorest and most long-standing communities have been shunned, and are often forced out. Despite this, it is impossible to deem great progress for a city as deserving of revitalization as Durham a bad thing. There will always be opponents to the ramifications of gentrification, but for Durham, a major component of The Research Triangle, such progress was inevitable and necessary.