UTSA President calls for creating bigger downtown presence
Photo: Scott Ball, Rivard Report
University of Texas at San Antonio President Taylor Eighmy forecasted the future of his school’s downtown campus and its potential to embed itself into the downtown landscape during a conversation with Centro San Antonio members on Wednesday.
Earlier this year, Eighmy revealed his vision for the near Westside area, saying he wanted to see more than 10,000 new students, two new schools, and two urban institutes in the next decade.
During his presentation, Eighmy elaborated on his plans, adding that he’s interested in developing a “distributed campus” not confined to UTSA’s current footprint downtown. Referencing the design of schools like Arizona State University and Northeastern University, Eighmy said some of the most successful urban schools are integrated within the downtown landscape, where a person can’t tell what is the city and what is the institute of higher education.
Eighmy didn’t give many details on how a “distributed campus” would be achieved. He said he doesn’t want the freeway or railroad tracks that border UTSA’s downtown campus on either side to be viewed as boundaries. He’s also interested in looking at a wider radius around campus to see how UTSA’s footprint could be expanded.
