Local South Bend NBC Affiliate WNDU is reporting that Notre Dame may be on summer break, but there’s more ’work’ than ever going on at Notre Dame.

Construction work, that is.

“We’re going through the most significant boom on construction we’ve had here in our history,” said Tim Sexton, Associate Vice President for Public Affairs.

There’s so much construction going on that the ’local’ labor force can’t keep up. Workers have been brought in from the likes of Indianapolis, Chicago, and Detroit.

“Right now, on line, we’ve got the Cross Roads Project behind me, we have a McCourtney Hall that’s being constructed, that’s our research building. We have two new dormitories that are going on,” said Sexton. “We have the Jenkins Hall that’s being constructed on Notre Dame Avenue. We have Nanovic Hall which is being constructed adjacent to Jenkins Hall.”

While you can still see familiar sights like the Golden Dome and Touchdown Jesus, the odds are great—not small that you’ll have to maneuver around a construction crane to get an unobstructed view.

A school that has spent an average of $95 million a year on construction for the past six years will spend an average of $237 million a year for the next three. That’s an increase of 249 percent.

The building boom is so big that it extends beyond the campus borders. Notre Dame is spending $7.5 million to build a new Turbomachinery research and testing facility about three miles south of campus in South Bend’s hi tech industrial park.

“That was something that we could have done on campus, but I think there was a strong desire on the leaders of the university to do this down at Ignition Park because we do believe that the Notre Dame Turbo Machinery Laboratory will drive otherbusinesses to this community and we’d rather have them be originating over at Ignition Park than here adjacent to campus,” said Sexton.

In the recent past, Notre Dame also renovated the historic Hansel Center building in Museum Row on West Washington Street.

While it’s hard to imagine the future looking brighter than the present, the future will apparently include the construction of a new Embassy Suites Hotel south of campus to complete phase one of the Eddy Street Commons project.

Discussions on phase two have already begun and details should be available in the next six to 12 months.

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