Holyoke Center To Be Finished

The University has completed preliminary plans and found adequate financing for the second half of the new Holyoke Center. Construction will begin in the near future.

L. Gard Wiggins, Harvard's administrative vice-President, said yesterday that the University "definitely intends to go ahead with construction."

Wiggins would not predict the exact time that construction will start, but the University is already well along with plans to move University offices in the area from buildings scheduled for demolition.

The Alumni Records Office will be the first building to be demolished. University officials are now looking for a new location for Alumni Records, and Wiggins said yesterday that the field "has been narrowed to two or three locations."

The first half of the Holyoke Center was completed late last fall at a cost of $4 million. That building now houses the University's health center, Stillman Infirmary, the main offices of the Summer School, the College admissions office, and offices for the Faculty of Arts and Sciences,

The original plans for the Holyoke Center called for eventual construction of a new building on the entire block bounded by Massachusetts Avenue and Dunster, Holyoke, and Mt. Auburn streets. The schedule envisioned construction of the Center in two main stages, the first of which was completed last fall.

Money for the first half of the Center was included in the $82.5 million Program for Harvard College, but University officials made no allowance in the Program for the second half of the building.

Since last fall, they have been searching for a means to finance the rest of the Center, and now that financial arrangements have been made, construction can proceed.