The graduates of yesteryear wouldn’t know the place.
Its iconic clock tower is one of the most striking landmarks on Galway’s skyline, yet the domed structure’s rich history belies the massive expansion of NUI Galway’s campus over the past decade or so.
The university has undergone three name changes in its 165-year history, but it is the sheer scale of its building developments in recent years that mark the biggest advance in an institution that now occupies 105 hectares, the majority of which lie along the banks of the River Corrib.
While the splendour of the Quadrangle built for the original Queen’s College retains the hallowed charm that befits one of the top universities in the country, a short walk through to the river brings you hurtling through to the modern era where state-of-the art buildings house ground-breaking research teams and knowledge-thirsty students.
Anyone who graduated with a UCG parchment, as was the case up until 1997, will struggle to recognise the place as it is now. An investment of €400 million over the past eight years has seen the addition of 14 new buildings spread out along a campus that is now divided into north and south wings.
One man who is about to retire after a more than 40-year association with the university says the growth of the campus in physical terms has been mind boggling.
A Tuam native, Professor Martin Feely, has taught in the Department of Earth and Ocean Sciences for the past 38 years. He says the development of the campus has happened around his feet.
“I’ve been based in the Quad since I came back to the college in 1976 to take up a lecturing post and its hard to believe the changes that have taken place since,” he said.
“My department and one other, Physiology, are the only two academic units that remain in the Quad, which up until the early 1970’s was the hub of the university. Even the library was here.
“Down through the years I have been lecturing on the main campus, where the addition of buildings such as the Arts Millennium building would have affected me as it is where I teach my first years. It also brought me into the heart of what we now call the south campus which has changed dramatically in the past few years in particular.
“The most recent developments have transformed the entire university, which bears no resemblance to that which I first knew when I started my studies here in 1969, but it’s and incredible transformation that bears testament to the increase in student numbers and the thriving research community we have here.”
Speaking of numbers, the university is now home to 17,282 students and a satff of 2,458, which would account for the need for more space.
One of the newer buildings to have sprung up along the course of the river in the past 12 months alone is a Biomedical Sciences Building that houses 300 scientists. While this impressive structure was constructed upon an expanse of green fields along the waterfront,other key additions to the campus have been slotted into previously unimaginable spaces. The James Hardiman library has seen not one but two extensions in the past five years, the most recent of which, the Hardiman Research Building, opened in May of this year.
A stone’s throw away sees a new Psychology building which has been tagged on to the Arts Millennium building and offers a unified home to the previously scattered psychology department that had four different locations throughout the campus. And all this is located opposite the 1970s splendour that is the two-towered Concourse building that will forever be the image conjured up by generations of graduates who are proud alumni of UCG.
Similarily, the coming together of the various engineering disciplines in a new state of the art building on the north campus has done a lot more than just provide a shiny new structure that was bestowed with the Public Choice Award in the Royal Institute of Architects in Ireland.
The next big unveiling will be that of the Institute of Lifecourse and Society, which gives a new home to the combined disciplines of gerontology, disability and the university’s child and family research centre, led by the UNESCO Chair in Children, Youth and Civic Engagement, Professor Pat Dolan.
With an annual research income of €55m. there has been a strong emphasis on developing state of the art facilities across all schools, however funding is also being funnelled into nurturing the vibrant arts and cultural community within the university.
Plans are well advanced for the development of a centre for drama, theatre and performance alongside the Bailey Allen Hall, which in a previous incarnation housed the university’s sports facilities. They were transposed with the building of a new sports centre in 2008, but the area that was once knows as Áras na Mac Léinn has now become a theatrical and cultural hub in the heart of the campus.
Developments with lesser visibility include the linking of the campus with the O’Shaughnessy Bridge, which aims to encourage sustainable travel in the city. The 50-metre bridge spans the Eglinton Canal, and accommodates both pedestrians and cyclists who use it as a speedier way of accessing the city centre. The bridge is named after Michael O’Shaughnessy, a civil engineering graduate of the university who was appointed chief engineer of the City of San Francisco in 1912 and went on to commission the design and construction of the Golden Gate bridge.
Another less obvious, but hugely significant, development that connects both ends of the campus is the park and ride service that was introduced to address the growing problem of parking in the university in 2009.
The driving vision of those at the helm of the €4000m capital investment will no doubt have further plans for future development after the last remaining buildings of the current plan are in place, which include a human biology building that has this week received €7 million in government funding.
But for now I’m sure all involved will happily settle in to their new homes throughout the vastly extended campus,which for many graduates and former employes will take some getting used to.
