Story by Bob Romantic
Photos by Darryl Webb
GCU News Bureau
Bare metal beams, trenches in the foundation and plenty of guys wearing hard hats greet you when you step into Grand Canyon University’s newest office space on 27th Avenue.
They’ll soon be replaced by two coffee stations with bar seating, two other break rooms, a giant fitness center, a serve-yourself convenience store and a smiling receptionist in the lobby.
It’s all part of the new 130,000-square-foot GCU Office Center that will hold about 600 employees, with room to grow to 1,000.
“Just looking at the coffee station and break area, it’s amazing. You can fit most of our staff in there,” said Chris Linderson, a vice president in the Office of Financial Assistance, after seeing an architect’s rendering of the facility. “We’re pumped.”
Linderson and her 82 employees are part of nine departments that will be relocating to the office center when it is completed this summer. She and her employees currently are found on the third floor of the Camelwest Office near 19th Avenue and Camelback Road.
Other departments making the move are:
- Accounting (coming from the main campus).
- Internal Audit, Procurement, Academic Operations, and Curriculum and Publishing (from Annex II adjacent to the main campus).
- Student Support, Student Services and Lopes (from Annex I adjacent to campus).
“It will be exciting to go to something new,” Linderson said. “One of our biggest excitements is being much closer to campus and getting more involved in activities on campus. Anything that makes us feel more part of campus is welcome.”
Shuttle service will be available to and from the main campus for meetings or for those who just want to come to campus for lunch.
Demolition of the interior of the office center, which previously was used for a swapmart, is complete and renovation of the building is underway.
The interior will have an open, industrial feel with 22-foot ceilings and modern lighting with three light levels available. To put the size of the 130,000-square-foot facility into context (that’s more than three acres), consider that the space for Annex I and Annex II – combined – is just 27,200 square feet.
Among the amenities that will be available in the building:
- Two large break rooms/coffee stations with plenty of seating, in addition to two smaller break rooms.
| For a slideshow of architect renderings of the 27th Avenue Office Center, click here. |
- An honor system convenience store, where employees can purchase food items by paying for them at a vendor kiosk.
- A 5,200-square-foot fitness center similar to the one on the main campus that will hold weights, workout machines, treadmills, etc.
- A 1,728-square-foot hardwood-floor exercise room for yoga classes or other group activities.
- Men’s and women’s locker rooms with showers.
- Six community conference rooms in addition to conference/training rooms within each department. A larger tiered-seating conference room/lecture hall also is being considered for future development.
Rich Oesterle, GCU’s assistant director of campus development, said renovation of the building is expected to be completed in July. “It will probably take a month or so to get all the different departments moved over,” he said.
Contact Bob Romantic at 639.7611 or [email protected].
