Arkansas State University is now more than halfway complete with its six phase campus improvement plan with the completion of the third and fourth phases of the project. 

According to an A-State press release “New lighting in the parking lots for first-year students in Kays Hall, University Hall and along Marion Berry Parkway was completed and activated.  Additional surveillance cameras will also be added in this corner of campus.”

In addition, new lighting and cameras have been added to the Centennial Stadium parking lot. These will be activated by A-State’s next home game on Saturday.

The project first began in 2016, when the Student Government Association approached campus leadership with the initiative to help students feel safer on campus. 

“During that campus walkthrough, we identified places where we needed to raise the canopy and cutaway trees or limbs and places where we needed to add lighting,” said Dr. Len Frey, executive vice chancellor for finance administration and chief operating officer. “That really prompted us to put together a plan to not only address those issues, but other safety issues over time.”

The entire project is projected to cost $2.6 million. The lighting and cameras near Kays Hall and University Hall cost $618,142. The Centennial Stadium section will cost $245,159. 

“Back in 2020, we created a specific safety fee. We’ve utilized that fee to provide some of the revenue, but we’ve also used other sources of revenue,” Frey said. “We’ve also funded it out of our maintenance budget and we’ve been funding as we go. We’re able to put about $700,000 a year toward these upgrades.”

The new lighting is also meant to be more environmentally conscious. The old bulbs were incandescent, while the new ones are LED. In addition, they direct light toward the ground as opposed to having it radiate everywhere. 

“You don’t want the light pollution,” said Dr. Bill Smith, chief communications officer. “It’s one thing to light up a parking lot. But if you just have all this extra unusable light, you want the light where you need it and that’s down on the ground where you need to see.”

Along with improving lighting and surveillance, the project also works on improving crosswalk safety. Currently, the university is conducting a study on promoting pedestrian protection. 

“That will provide us with a plan to improve this situation, especially when it’s related to the crosswalks to try to improve that safety,” Smith said. 

After the completion of the Centennial Stadium phase, the project will move to adding lighting at the Equine Center. It will cost $339,486.

“It’s mostly a daytime use facility, but the demand is such that families are coming in and they’re wanting to run their horses at these events,” Smith said. “They’re getting in and out of the parking lot well, but it sure would help if they had some lights.”

The project will be complete once new lighting along Dean Street and the Reng Student Union is installed. This will cost $454,159.

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