A master plan for 100 acres of land donated to develop a University of North Texas campus in Frisco has been presented to university regents.
The Denton Record-Chroncile reports that the first-phase plan of the University of North Texas New College at Frisco will cost about $100 million and include roads, parking lots, the first academic building, a nature pavilion and a footbridge to an mixed-use development.
The university has hired Ayers Saint Gross to help design the project. Construction is slated to begin in October 2020 and be completed in November 2022.
“They understand what a unique opportunity this is to build a green field campus from scratch; it’s a rare and exciting opportunity,” says Bob Brown, the university's senior vice president of finance and administration. “They understood that we wanted to create a different student experience for this campus, leveraging the best of who we are in the creative economy while connecting with business and community partners throughout Frisco.”
The university has formed a partnership with the city of Frisco to fuel the school's development of a campus branch in Collin County. The New College at Frisco first opened in spring 2016, and the university bought Inspire Park, an incubator space, from the city last year. The 100-acre lot for the new campus is several miles away.
Brown showed the Board of Regents the 20-year plan for building out the entire campus in different phases. The timing and cost of those phases will be based on potential growth. Internally, University officials say they believe that in the next 20 years the campus could have as many as 20,000 students.
In the full campus plan, officials hope to have several academic buildings, a business conference center, two parking garages, an event quad and amphitheater; about 45 acres would remain undeveloped.
“Almost half the site will stay green and we’re leaving the wetland areas alone,” Brown says. “We’re going to do an education center in that area so we can take advantage of the natural beauty of the site.”
There are no plans for on-campus housing at this time, Brown says. Instead, students are likely to live at the mixed-use development that will be accessible by the footbridge across Panther Creek Parkway.
