School's out - to take over half the city

The $2 billion expansion is outlined in the university's 2020 Masterplan, designed to relieve a campus already groaning after an almost 30 per cent increase in student numbers since 1990 - and growing.

"We're pretty much bursting at the seams," said Bob Kotic, the university's chief operating officer.

"So we do need to [expand] in terms of quality for staff and students. That's why North Eveleigh and Harold Park are so critical for us."

The draft masterplan, which has been circulated to staff for feedback, proposes to demolish and rebuild the entire Darlington precinct and acquire North Eveleigh, Harold Park and Callan Park to create a "university arc" on the city's western fringe.

North Eveleigh would be divided into commercial, cultural and residential precincts, including sporting fields accommodation for 1200 people, which would be a "softer option" for the site than a commercial project, Mr Kotic said.

"We feel building from three to five storeys is really what's appropriate … otherwise you look like the UTS tower and it's just not appealing."

The Redfern-Waterloo Authority plans to sell the 11-hectare former railway site at North Eveleigh in the next year and has received the university's plans but there have been no formal discussions.

Universities have increased their student populations by almost a third over the past decade, partly through a boost in the number of international students they have been forced to recruit to maintain their incomes as federal government funding has slipped.

The University of Sydney, which expects to have the equivalent of 40,000 full-time students by 2020, has roughly doubled its proportion of international students to just under 20 per cent over the last 15 years.

The University of NSW is getting rid of surface car parks to make way for $130 million worth of developments for its Campus 2020 plan including a cancer research centre and accommodation for more than 1300 students.

The space-strapped University of Technology, Sydney, wants to expand its footprint in the city by moving into some of the buildings it already owns and turning them over to university business.

It wants to move into the Dairy Farmers building in Haymarket that it currently leases to EnergyAustralia, turn its car park building on Broadway into classrooms and research space, and build additional stories on its Harris Street buildings.

In the ultimate gesture of thriftiness, it is considering turning its roof space into sports areas.

But it does not plan to acquire more land, said Patrick Woods, the deputy vice-chancellor for resources.

"We're aware that the land that we do own, once we've built it out, should give us what we need," Mr Woods said.

"UTS is not planning a substantial growth of its student body. Our plan is to be a medium-sized, high quality university, not a large broadly based liberal arts university."

This week the NSW Department of Planning approved the university's application to rezone the land on its Kuring-gai campus so it does not have to be used exclusively for education purposes and can be developed or sold.

Map: www.smh.com.au/ffximage/2008/06/22/syduni_map_wideweb__470x397,2.jpg

Source: www.smh.com.au/news/national/schools-out--to-take-over-half-the-city/2008/06/22/1214073053671.html