UVA panel gets update on construction projects

The construction boom at the University of Virginia continues with major projects across all of the various sections of Grounds and beyond. The Buildings and Grounds Committee of the Board of Visitors got an update at their meeting on September 17 after hearing a discussion about architectural styles at UVA. More on that in the near future.

Mark Stennis, director of Capital Construction and Renovations at UVA, began the tour at the Fontaine Research Park where the exterior of the $350 million Paul and Diane Manning Institute of Biotechnology is nearly complete.

“All the trade crews are working mainly on the inside of the building, and there’s about 350 tradespeople on site every day right now,” Stennis said. “This building will be and is the single largest laboratory building on any higher ed in the Commonwealth.”

The first phase of the building is expected to be complete in early 2028.

Resources:

• Staff report for September 17, 2026 Buildings and Grounds Committee meeting
• Presentation for September 17, 2026 Buildings and Grounds Committee meeting

There’s a lot of activity on the Ivy Corridor with the Virginia Guesthouse now open to guests. Two student housing buildings are under construction with 780 beds and those will be ready for occupation by the fall of 2027. These will mostly be apartment style with kitchens

“This building will have a dining facility, student spaces, and a grab-and-go and coffee area, Stennis said. “The other interesting thing, in an effort to improve connectivity across Grounds, currently there’s only about a four and a half to a five-foot sidewalk on Copeley Bridge on the east side. We are actively working to increase that to nine feet, nine and a half feet on the east side.”

That work involves coordination with both the Virginia Department of Transportation and the railroad.

There are also 348 bedrooms of student housing at Darden which Stennis said would be complete in April 2027.

“We will be adding about between these two, 1,100 beds, just UVA beds,” Stennis. “And then between the Blume and the Verve, a total of about 3,000 new beds will be coming online nominally next summer. So that’s a lot of new beds.”

The Blume and Verve are student housing buildings being built by national companies.

The Karsh Institute of Democracy will be largely complete this fall but the 425-seat auditorium won’t be ready until April 2027.

One member of the panel asked how much consideration has been made to adding additional density on Ivy Road. UVA Architect Alice Raucher said the streetscape along Ivy Road is already improved.

“I don’t know if you recall what Emmett and Ivey used to look like,” Raucher said. “They were very narrow sidewalks with utility poles in the middle of them. So we’ve widened the sidewalks. We have tree lawns. They’re well-lit. They’re tree-lined. So that helps at the ground level. And with the President’s Connected Grounds initiatives, we’re also looking at potential pedestrian bridges that could perhaps connect ART grounds to the Emmett Ivy Corridor and the Center for the Arts.”

The North Ground Parking Garage will add 1,030 new parking spaces to UVA’s inventory and will have a large transit hub along one side of the building. Stennis said that should be open by November.

Crews are also at work fitting out the upper levels of the UVA Hospital’s South Tower which will be complete this December. Floor six will be oncology and cellular therapy with 29 rooms, floor seven will be pediatric intensive care with 29 new rooms and floor eight will be neonatal intensive care with 47 new units.

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