Hudson County Community College to Hold Grand Opening of New Library Building on September 29th
September 8, 2014
Area elected officials to join faculty, staff and administrators in ribbon-cutting ceremonies for new, six-story building on College’s Journal Square campus.
September 8, 2014, Jersey City, NJ – On Monday morning, September 29, 2014, elected officials and other community leaders will gather with the Trustees, students, faculty, staff, and administration of Hudson County Community College (HCCC) at 71 Sip Avenue in Jersey City. There, they will participate in ribbon-cutting ceremonies heralding the official Grand Opening of the College’s new Library Building.
The six-story, multifunctional structure is 112,000 square feet overall. Entrance to the building from Sip Avenue is available through a soaring, two-story lobby. Adjacent to the lobby is the HCCC Liberty Café, a coffee bar that will also offer pastries, sandwiches, and snacks.
The building’s first two stories (street-level and second floor), with 33,500 square feet of space, are dedicated to the Library itself. Included here is a “Makerspace,” an area that promotes learning through creativity and crafting, and will be utilized by the College’s students and staff as well as by members of the community. A meditation room and three group-study rooms are also included in the Library’s space.
Situated on floors three through five are 33 classrooms (traditional classrooms, computer labs and tiered lecture halls) and 21 faculty stations. Two rooms on the fifth floor are being named in honor of notable Hudson County natives; the lecture hall (Room 527) will be named for Jersey City educator and HCCC Board of Trustees member, the late Alfred E. Zampella, and a Community Education classroom (Room 518) will bear the name of nationally acclaimed historian Thomas J. Fleming.
The Benjamin J. Dineen, III and Dennis C. Hull Gallery, plus an exhibit space, the College’s 9/11 Monument, and three classrooms will be found on the sixth floor. There is also a roof terrace on this floor, from which one may enjoy spectacular views of Hudson County and the Hudson and Hackensack Rivers.
Construction on the HCCC Library Building began in November 2012, and the “topping-out” ceremony was held in April 2013. The building was designed by NK Architects, and includes a number of sustainable materials and features.
The HCCC Library Building is an integral part of the College’s $250 million capital expansion and improvement master plan that has included the from-the-ground-up construction of the HCCC Culinary Arts Conference Center and the pocket park located across the street from it on the Journal Square (Jersey City) campus, as well as the North Hudson Higher Education Center in Union City. The College has also repurposed/revitalized buildings at 2 Enos Place, One PATH Plaza, 81 Sip Avenue, and 119 Newkirk Street in the Journal Square area of Jersey City. All of these endeavors have helped promote local development and stabilization, and have brought more security to these areas. The College invested an additional $100 million to outfit these buildings with the latest technologies and information systems.
Additional details on the HCCC Library Building – and the events accompanying the Grand Opening – will be made available in the weeks ahead.