Former Workforce One and Hollywood Video buildings to house university’s fine and performing arts programs until new Tamarack Hall is constructed 
Indiana University Northwest announced today that it has signed a lease with property management firm Gateway Arthur, Inc., for two buildings in the Village Shopping Center at 37th Avenue and Grant Street. The former Workforce One and Hollywood Video buildings will serve as temporary locations for the university’s Fine Arts and Performing Arts departments while the university moves ahead with the construction of a new Tamarack Hall.
Also, the campus’s new Park and Ride lot will be located in the Arts on Grant parking lot. The space will provide ample additional parking for students, faculty and staff, and a free shuttle service will provide safe and easy transport to the Moraine Student Center and the Library Conference Center on campus. The service launches with the start of fall classes on Aug. 30 and runs from 8 a.m. until 6 p.m. Mondays through Thursdays while classes are in session.
“The Arts on Grant facility will be a wonderful resource for our university, and especially for our fine and performing arts departments,” said IU Northwest Chancellor William J. Lowe. “These popular and important academic programs have been severely affected by the loss of Tamarack Hall, and we see Arts on Grant as a good temporary location, while we begin to plan for a new Tamarack that promises to be a signature building for our campus.”
The Chancellor also commended the Office of Administration and the Office of Facilities Planning for finding creative ways to address the university’s need for expanded parking with the Arts on Grant project. IU Northwest is anticipating another large enrollment increase this fall, after seeing enrollment jump 16 percent in 2009.
“It is important that we accommodate all of our new and returning students, as well as our faculty and staff colleagues, with safe and accessible parking options,” Dr. Lowe said. “The Park and Ride lot at Arts on Grant will fulfill that need, and our new RedHawk Shuttle will provide convenient and timely transportation for those who use the lot. I encourage both our students and our colleagues on campus to utilize this new service.”
The university’s lease on the two buildings calls for an occupancy of four years, with four subsequent one-year options. Planning for the new Tamarack remains in the early phases and no timetable for construction or completion has been set.
The original Tamarack Hall, the campus’s first structure, was damaged in a September 2008 flood and closed permanently as a result.
The Fine Arts department is expected to move its operations into the Arts on Grant space sometime in early 2011, following necessary modifications to the larger building. The timetable for moving Performing Arts into its new space is not set at this time.
The larger of the two buildings is 19,000 square feet. The smaller one, formerly a video store, is 5,000 square feet. That building is expected to house an intimate “black box” performance venue for Theatre Northwest, the performance arm of the Performing Arts program.
The larger building will house classrooms and ceramics, sculpture, photography, and painting studios, as well as the theater department’s scene and costume shop.
For more information about IU Northwest Park & Ride, visit the Web at http://www.iun.edu/~rshuttle/.