UCF delays downtown Orlando campus opening by one year

Chairman: We better be on time and on budget

UCF has decided to delay opening its downtown Orlando campus to August 2019 — a year later than planned, the school reported Thursday.

The decision was made to avoid opening the campus in the middle of an academic year, officials said.

Marcos Marchena, the school’s trustee chairman, said UCF has had a sense of urgency to push the project forward and established aggressive deadlines. But he said it made sense to delay the original start date of August 2018, especially since the university had only awarded the contract to build the campus in June.

“Once you begin the project, by God, we better be on time and on budget,” Marchena said.

Marchena said it was better to delay than risk starting the first classes in the second semester of 2018-2019. He said he does not expect the change to affect the project’s $60 million-price tag

“This project is a long-term project for UCF and for the community,” Marchena said. “Whether it opens in 2018 or 2019, in the long run, will be insignificant.”

The site where the Amway Arena once stood will be the new home for several programs, including social work, legal studies and the bachelor’s degree in human

communication from the Nicholson School of Communication.

Valencia College expects to move its hospitality and culinary programs downtown, as well.

The campus is the university’s most high-profile expansion since it opened a medical school in 2009.

Over the summer, reality began to set in that the downtown Orlando campus — a complex that involves student housing, integrating new technology, parking and a partnership between two public schools — would not meet its ambitious opening goal.

“Twenty-four months is just too quick. It’s probably more like 30 months, but that puts it in the middle of the school year,” said Orlando developer Craig Ustler, a partner on the city’s Creative Village project who is building student housing downtown. “This is not a run-of-the-mill project. It’s not a standard academic building.”

Even after most construction is completed, the schools will have to spend time building out a culinary school and other unique features, he added.

UCF leaders fought for the downtown campus for months, leading to its eventual approval this year.

State education officials initially questioned whether the campus would reach its expected enrollment of 7,700 students or if it was a worthy of public money at a time when other universities also had needs. Some faculty also voiced concerns about moving 13 miles away from the main campus.

In June 2015, Gov. Rick Scott vetoed $15 million for the campus as part of $460 million in state budget cuts.

But UCF officials regrouped and pitched a downsized plan that would need only $20 million in state funding — instead of the original $60 million-proposal — to construct the main academic building at the campus. The revised project also hangs on $20 million in university money and $20 million raised in donations.

Finally, in March, the downtown campus won two victories in a row — endorsement from the state education board that oversees public universities and from the governor, who did not veto the campus funding again.

The new time line puts shovels in the ground by October or November 2017, Marchena said.