Napier announce upgrade of city centre campus

Edinburgh Napier University has announced a multi-million pound renovation scheme to its Merchiston campus in the city’s Bruntsfield area.

This is part of the University's £100 million estates strategy which includes the recent opening of the new Sighthill campus. It is hopeed the renovation will “provide students and staff with some of the very best teaching and learning facilities in Scotland”.

The re-vamp will include a new reception complex, as well as building state-of-the-art music studios. Changes will also be made to teaching areas in the main building in order to accommodate students and staff moving from the Craighouse campus, which was sold earlier this year and is due to be vacated in the summer of 2013.

The upgrade has been designed by RMJM, the same architects responsible for designing the University’s £60 million Sighthill campus that opened in January this year, and depending on pending planning applications, work will commence in January 2012 and finish in early 2013.

Edinburgh Napier currently operates across four major campuses in the capital, as well as smaller sites in West Lothian and the Borders. However, with the recent sale of Craighouse, its main campuses will be at Merchiston, Craiglockhart and Sighthill.

Merchiston is currently an eclectic site, incorporating both ancient buildings such as the 13th-century Napier Tower and the modern Jack Kilby 24 hour computing centre. It is hoped that the new developments will improve the overall standards and learning experience for students.

However, some have had mixed reactions to the announcement, expressing that if such large sums of money are available to the University then they should be spent on other necessities. Gavin Harper, a third year student at Edinburgh Napier who as a student in the School of Creative Industries will be affected by the re-vamp, told The Journal:

“I think that the redevelopment of the Merchiston campus is badly overdue. The building has begun to look tired and needs fairly extensive work to improve upon this. It could be the wrong time for Napier to be making such drastic moves though, as the money they're proposing to spend could well be used on other things that would directly affect the students in a greater way.

“Also it comes not long after the new Sighthill campus was opened, so you have to question where, in a period of cutbacks and economic hardship, this money is coming from and if it is being used to its full potential? It would be nice, from a student's point of view, to see the University putting this funding into something that will directly impact upon the quality of our learning, rather than the buildings in which we learn.”

Professor Dame Joan Stringer, Principal and Vice-Chancellor of the University, outlined the commitment to spending with the students’ best interests at heart, saying: “We are committed to enhancing the student experience, and we will continue to invest in our facilities to ensure that we provide an inspiring learning and teaching environment.”