New Bouquet Gardens opens

Pitt will open this week more than 100 more beds at its most-sought after housing option.

The… Pitt will open this week more than 100 more beds at its most-sought after housing option.

The 155 sophomores and juniors who move into the newly built portion of the Bouquet Gardens apartments will have a full kitchen, bathroom and living room with a 42-inch television in each of the 49 units. Pitt has had the expansion in the works for more than two years, at a cost of more than $13.4 million, according to the website of PJ Dick Inc., the University’s contractor for the project.

“Construction will be complete in early August, and the building will be ready for students’ arrival in the fall,” said Eli Shorak, Pitt’s associate vice chancellor for business Eli Shorak said.

Shorak said the new four-story building, which is slightly farther off Forbes Avenue than current Bouquet Gardens buildings, was necessary because Pitt’s undergraduate on-campus housing demand increases each year.

According to the website of PJ Dick Inc., each of the 49 new units contains a full kitchen, living room and bathroom. The building will also hold a lounge and laundry facilities.

Pitt spokesman John Fedele said the funds came from Pitt auxiliary debt.

Students were assigned to the new living spaces through the same lottery-bidding process as governs the other on-campus, apartment-style housing options.

Suites in the new space cost the same as all other Bouquet Gardens apartments: $3,650 per semester. But the new rooms come with an additional feature not present in the older version of the apartments.

Shorak said that each new Bouquet Gardens apartment will include one 42-inch flat-screen television, which will be mounted in the living room.

The new complex will also include a fitness center available to the entire Bouquet Gardens community. Fitness center access will be activated on students’ Pitt IDs prior to their arrival in the fall.

And apartment residents who would prefer to get their exercise by biking across campus will now have a place to store their two-wheeled rides. The apartments will feature indoor bicycle storage for all Bouquet Gardens residents.

There are currently no plans to begin any further construction in the vicinity of the new apartments.