Princeton University officials break ground on 400-acre campus

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Princeton University officials formally broke ground Dec. 7 on a new, 400-acre campus in West Windsor.

Once completed in 2025, the campus will include housing for 600 postdoctoral researchers and graduate students, as well as athletic facilities and a parking garage temperature-controlled by a new geo-exchange facility using underground thermal energy rather than electricity.

The new development – the Princeton Lake Campus –  “will provide potential sites for locating world-class scientific facilities,” Princeton University President Christopher Eisgruber said during a groundbreaking ceremony.

It will provide “places to live and gather; opportunities to engage in an expanded ecosystem of woodlands, courtyards, meadows, and tree clusters” and other athletic facilities, he added.

The graduate student and researcher housing will be finished by 2023, along with the parking garage. By 2025, the campus’ new athletic facilities are expected to be completed, including tennis and squash courts, a fitness space, softball stadium, a cross-country course and playing fields for rugby and other sports, university officials said.

Princeton plans to  use the geo-exchange technology as part of a “passive home design,” meaning it relies more on built-in features of the structure for ventilation and climate control rather than electricity.