Construction commences at site of new home of CHBS

To accommodate construction of the College of Humanities and Behavioral Sciences (CHBS) Building, Lucas Hall demolition began July 9th. The new academic facility for CHBS, announced in February, will house many of the college's departments, currently scattered across the Radford University campus in seven different locations. Communication, criminal justice, psychology, sociology, political science, English, foreign language, history, philosophy & religious studies and the Office of the Dean will be among the departments that will call the new building home. The $52.8 million, 143,600-sq. foot CHBS building is expected to be completed in 2016.

Located between Muse Hall and McConnell Library, Lucas Hall was completed in 1929 and was named for Clara Lucas McConnell, wife of the university's first president. The brick structure has served a variety of functions, including student activities, academic instruction and as offices of University Advancement, Alumni Affairs and, most recently, the College of Graduate and Professional Studies. The new CHBS building will honor Lucas Hall's heritage by incorporating into its construction wood flooring salvaged from the building.

The CHBS building will have an entrance facing Main Street as well as an entrance from the campus quadrangle. It will have a Georgian face to the quadrangle that complements the current architecture of the campus and will present a contemporary face to Main Street. The building will also feature a landscaped courtyard, a 90-seat classroom, moot courtroom with adjacent classroom, television studio, forensic laboratory and an emergency operations training center that will double as RU's actual emergency operations center, as necessary.

Since 2005, Radford University has secured approval and funding for more than $300 million in capital projects, including both new construction and renovation. In 2008, Radford opened the state-of-the-art Covington Center for Visual and Performing Arts and in fall 2012, opened a new 110,000 square-foot, $44 million building for the College of Business and Economics. The university also has renovated several residence halls, the campus' largest dining facility (Dalton Hall) and the technologically advanced Young Hall, as well as constructed the Hurlburt Student Center. Current construction projects include the 110,000 square-foot, $32 million Recreation and Wellness Center, slated to open this fall, and the 114,000 square-foot, $49.5 million Center for the Sciences, projected to open in 2015.