Y, How You’ve Changed

Replaced and improved, revamped and upgraded— the changes of the last decade have brought a new sheen to campus while maintaining the familiar spirit of BYU.

Summer 2017 Issue

Since its birth at the dawn of the 20th century, BYU’s upper campus has almost always been marked by scaffolding and cranes. From its golden infancy at the southwest crest of Temple Hill through those awkward growth-spurt years, when a sprouting student body outgrew buildings faster than President Ernest L. Wilkinson (BA ’21) could build them, until today, as a maturing campus is refined and rejuvenated, BYU has continually reinvented its campus home.

As alumni drop by to visit their old campus, they are often heard to exclaim, in essence, “My, how you’ve grown!” or “I remember you when . . .” And yet, though the place has grown into the full stature of a thriving modern university, these visitors say they find the old familiar friend beneath the ever-evolving façade.

Since not all alumni are able to return and be reacquainted with campus in person, we offer here a stroll down its sidewalks, showing the most recent decade of changes alongside views of the campus that alumni knew way back when.

First Up, New Dorms:

When 1950s BYU administrators began constructing a new sort of campus living facility—one that would help train students in real-life domestic skills—they held a naming contest. The residents dubbed the complex Heritage Halls, and the individual buildings (eventually 24 in all) were each named after a prominent Latter-day Saint woman.

Six decades and tens of thousands of residents later, in 2011 BYU began replacing the apartments (as well as the Deseret Towers dormitory buildings) with grand, modern residence halls. With the 13th and final hall finished this summer, the popular complex will accommodate 2,750 students. The new Heritage Halls feature large murals in the common rooms on each of the building’s four floors, memorializing a location from Church history—from Sharon, Vermont, to Ensign Peak in Utah.

Changes to Campus Drive:

When BYU began a remodel of Campus Drive in 2013, a major goal was to make a more unified and pedestrian-friendly campus. Today North Campus Drive ends at the Museum of Art parking lot, the bridge to the Clark Law Building has been removed, and sidewalks and a pedestrian plaza link Heritage Halls and the Law School to central campus.

Life Sciences Building on South Campus:

“This building moves us right to the edge of the future.” So proclaimed Dean Rodney J. Brown (BS ’72) at the 2014 dedication of the massive Life Sciences Building. The state-of-the-art facility is crammed with teaching and research labs (81) and office space, student study halls, a parking facility, and an enclosed central stairway to upper campus. The new Life Sciences Building consolidated departments previously located across campus, including in the Benjamin Cluff Building and the Widtsoe Building. The Widtsoe Building was razed in 2014, after nearly 45 years of service, leaving an open quad in its place.

New Buildings on North Campus:

The campus horizon looks different from the north. BYUtv, BYU Radio, and KBYU moved into the new, state-of-the art Broadcasting Building in 2011. Its neighbor, the Marriott Center, grew this year with the addition of the Marriott Center Annex, which houses student-athlete practice courts and a Cougar-basketball Hall of Honor. And the close-by Monte L. Bean Life Science Museum was remade in spectacular fashion. And then, of course, there are two tall new MTC towers dominating the skyline (more on those to come). In the photos below, see north campus through the years.