The preparation for the University of Oregon’s north campus conditional use permit application is drawing to a close and the community will have one more opportunity to see updated plans before the application is submitted to the city for consideration.
Campus Planning and Facilities Management staff will host an open house from 3 to 7 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 11, in Room 202, Ford Alumni Center. Cameron McCarthy Landscape Architecture and Planning, the project consultant, also will be available for questions.
The open house is a follow-up to several meetings with university and community stakeholders and an event in November, when almost 100 interested campus and community members were able to weigh in on the plans. The current version has been approved by the university’s Campus Planning Committee.
“We have received a great deal of feedback over the last several months and have used it to shape the proposed plan,” said Emily Eng, senior planner and project lead. “The intent of the plan is to protect the river and accommodate potential future growth. Approval by the city will enable the university to engage in more detailed planning as project opportunities arise.”
Eng said those projects will ultimately follow the university’s own site selection and inclusive design processes, as laid out in the Campus Plan. Without permit approval, the university will not be able to build or make improvements in the area, ranging from a small storage building to large-scale riparian restoration project.
Based on the Campus Physical Framework Vision Project and the Eugene land use code, the North Campus Conditional Use Permit Project consists of three key elements:
- A master site plan for the entire north campus area delineated by the S-RP zone, about 70 acres, required for the land use application to the city.
- A conceptual study for the university’s land in the S-RP zone between the railroad tracks and the Willamette River. The conceptual study informs the master site plan, exploring options for physical education and recreation fields and support facilities, bike path configurations, ecological restoration, river access and other university uses.
- A land use application package for city review through the conditional use permit process and concurrent applications.
The conditional use permit application is expected to be submitted to the city for its consideration in January, with a public hearing anticipated to be scheduled in the late spring or summer of 2018. Check the project web page for updates: