The School of Engineering and Applied Science has made tremendous gains in the past decade under the leadership and support of President Shapiro.

Space is our most inflexible resource, as it takes several years to develop a concept and justification, to obtain approval from the trustees, to hire an architect for design, to woo the Princeton borough planning board, to solicit bids from builders, and to put a hole in the ground.

This is particularly difficult during an economic boom, because with so much work available, the market belongs to the contractors . The J wing extension to the E-Quad was completed in 1992, which brought partial relief to the fledgling efforts of the POEM (Photonic and Optoelectronic Materials) and to the MAE department.

The Friend Center

The Friend Center for Engineering Education is scheduled for completion this September, and we are looking for a good October date to dedicate this magnificent building, to coincide with a football game. As you probably have heard, the FC is like a parlor: dedicated to the library, the large lecture halls, the computer clusters, and conference facilities.

When some of these functions are moved from the E-Quad and the Computer Science Building, the space left behind will be renovated to make space for laboratories and offices.

We believe that this age is driven by advances in technology, and the activities of the School have to expand to fulfill our obligations. The new technologies of biotechnology, environment, information technologies, and advanced materials will promote future growth in the world, both for prosperity at home and for peace abroad.

We also have an obligation to teach AB students at Princeton about technology, which would put them in a good position to become leaders in whatever field they select.

Block Site Plan

So even before the completion of the Friend Center, we have hired the architectural firm of Pei, Cobb, Freed to think about future space needs. After a number of iterations, they have come up with a design that is called the E-Quad Block Site Development Plan that has fired our imaginations, and has been accepted by our trustees.

First for a bit of grand vision. East of Olden Street, the E-Quad in the shape of the letter P will remain the core of engineering space, which is zoned for laboratories and experiments. West of Olden Street, the Computer Science building and the new Friend Center will form a giant right arm, extending west from the E-Quad toward the main campus, beckoning people to come and visit us.

Bernini designed the front colonnade of St. Peters cath edral in Rome as two giant arms, which reach out to the world as a symbol. We hope that some day, there will be a giant left arm from the E-Quad as well.

In the future, you will walk along McCosh Walk from Washington Road, past the fountain of the Woodrow Wilson School and the Frick Chemistry Lab, between the giant welcoming arms to the E-Quad.

You will enter a lobby filled with light from two courtyards, and you will have a choice to descend into the one on the left--which is the seldom-used courtyard that dates from 1962--or the one on the right, which is a brand new one yet to be created.

You will find the low-profile von Neumann and Energy Wing buildings gone, replaced by two curved buildings that extend from the E-Wing (current home of civil and ORFE) to the A-D junction (current home of chemical and MAE), enclosing the new courtyard. These two curved buildings will add 90,000 square feet of space and will be bigger than the entire Computer Science building.

How would this new space be carved up into different uses? I have certainly heard many ingenious and excellent ideas, as well as having some of my own. But the question will be fully answered only after the future dean and department chairs have their say. We trust that they would enormously enjoy carving up the pie.

The E-Quad Block Site Development Plan. The main entrance to the building is marked by the arrow.