 "Photo: Oliver Scott Snure, Collegian")
This year, the Campus Center Hotel is undergoing a long-anticipated facelift as extensive renovations to the electrical wiring, furniture and electronics for each of the hotel's 116 guest rooms began this month.
The renovations, which are expected to cost around $9.2 million, include an upgrade to the heating and air conditioning units for each of the guest rooms, a complete revamp of the bathrooms, queen-sized beds, all new ergonomic furniture and wall-mounted flat screen high-definition television screens. These are the first extensive changes that the facility has undergone since it opened in 1970.
The majority of the funding, $7.2 million, for the project is being financed through the University of Massachusetts building authority, while UMass Auxiliary Services are providing the remaining $2 million.
"My feeling is that once it is completed, the facility will be well-positioned in the local hospitality market. What we're trying to create is a 3-star facility," Campus Center Hotel Manager David O'Connor said.
According to O'Connor, the decision to renovate the hotel was made because of the increase in the number of hotel rooms that the Amherst-Hadley area has seen in the past 5-to-10 years. Hotels such as the Courtyard by Marriot, the Holiday Inn, the Econolodge and the Hampton Inn, sit along Route 9 and cater to many UMass students and their families throughout the school year.
It is these hotels that have pushed the Campus Center Hotel to undergo renovations as a means to remain a competitive business, attractive to students and their families.
However, the newly improved hotel rooms will come at a higher price for guests. Weekday rates, which currently run at $92 per room, will rise by around $15, while the rate to rent a room on a busy weekend, now $130, could climb to $185.
Renovations are expected to continue until April and will be conducted on one floor at a time, leaving three floors available for guests. Right now however, two floors are being renovated, leaving only floors six and seven available.
Renovations will not affect the Campus Center or students living in temporary hotel housing, who were scheduled to leave the hotel for permanent room assignments in residence halls last Friday.
Stella Cernak can be reached at ccernak@student.umass.edu.
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