Delta Upsilon fraternity will break ground on its new house at 3 p.m. this Saturday, Event Chair Tom Spiegel said.
The groundbreaking will take place at 135 Madison Lane, where the Madison House Apartments were demolished Monday, he said. The ceremony will include speeches from Leonard Sandridge, executive vice president and chief operating officer; Mayor David Norris; Justin Kirk, executive director of the Delta Upsilon International fraternity and Beta Theta Pi alumnus Tim Akers, said Jay Hoover, president of the Virginia Delta Upsilon Alumni Association.
"The idea is for us to try to [start] this off on the right note," Hoover said, "thanking the people that we should thank and looking forward to the future, celebrating something that hasn't been done in a long time and that no one gets to do very often at Virginia."
He said Delta Upsilon is taking advantage of a rare opportunity, in that this will be the first fraternity house constructed at the University in 50 years. Delta Upsilon members are currently occupying a house at 180 Rugby Road, the former Beta Theta Pi house, Hoover said, and alumni groups from both fraternities had negotiated for years to reach an agreement that would return the Rugby Road house to Beta Theta Pi and provide Delta Upsilon with a house.
Beta Theta Pi ended up giving Delta Upsilon a "reasonable price" for the house and helped them locate the location on Madison Lane, Hoover said. He described the Rugby Road house as "an aging house that [needed] a lot of work," and said that Delta Upsilon welcomed the opportunity to build a new house.
"We're very happy to be looking at striking out on our own and putting our own name on a house that we've designed from the ground up," he said.
Delta Upsilon is using the services of local contractor Martin Horn and architect Jim Grigg from Charlottesville firm Daggett + Grigg, Hoovers aid.
"What we wanted to do was fit into this historical character of the neighborhood but also introduce internally ... all the most recent improvements in technology, as well as energy sustaining green features to the extent we could do so," Hoover said.
From the outside, the house will look like a typical fraternity house at the University, complete with red brick and white columns, he said.
"It really looks very neo-classical Jeffersonian," Hoover said. "It fits in very well."
The two-story house will consist of 15 single bedrooms, including two handicap-accessible rooms on the first floor, that are all wired for cable and Internet. The house will have central air conditioning, as well as insulation and double paned windows that will reduce energy use. Delta Upsilon expects to occupy the house by August 2010, Hoover said.
Delta Upsilon President Ryan Cunningham said the fraternity's brothers are excited for the transition to the new house. "Everybody understands the fact that we're getting a new house is a real plus for us," he said, noting that members will benefit from the modern interior as well as the house's location. Members are also looking forward to the groundbreaking ceremony, Cunningham said.
"It's just really nice to be in the limelight that way, to just have that one day devoted to us," he said. "It should be a really positive experience for all of us"
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