City College Breaks Ground on $155M Complex

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City College of San Francisco broke ground on its long-awaited STEAM Building in mid December.

The $155 million state-of-art complex for science, technology, engineering, arts and mathematics (STEAM) disciplines will be built on the college’s car parking lot facing Frida Kahlo Way.

The college anticipates the new class spaces and offerings the complex provides will help students obtain hands-on learning experiences that will enable them to secure good-paying jobs.

Architectural rendering — A rendering of the STEAM Building courtyard. | Courtesy image

“The design for the new [STEAM Building] creates a multi-disciplinary heart of the campus, with spaces designed to support the entire college community,” according to the ground breaking ceremony program. “The new building incorporates flexible social and study space to encourage interdisciplinary interaction, including a multi-use innovation center; state-of-the-art science labs for biology, chemistry, and physics; and computer labs and visual arts spaces.”

The new complex will also provide support spaces for the decades-in-the-making but-not yet-built Performing Arts and Education Center that will display the incalculably valuable Diego Rivera fresco Pan American Unity.

A courtyard between the two facilities is designed to provide opportunities for flexible space, built-in seating, furnishing, public art displays and native landscape.

Left: A map of City College's flagship Ocean campus. Right: The site plan for the STEAM Building. | Courtesy images

The facility is paid for through Proposition A, an $845 million bond passed by voters in 2020 to update the college’s aged buildings, build new facilities and make earthquake safety upgrades.

Construction started in earnest with the installation of a fence around the site in late December. The project completion date is Spring 2026.

The architecture firm for the facility is Smith Group and the construction company is Rudolph and Sletten.

Speakers at the ground breaking ceremony included District 7 Supervisor Myrna Melgar, outgoing Trustees Brigitte Davila and John Rizzo, former Trustee Alex Randolph and Mitra Sapienza, the president of the college’s Academic Senate. Entertainment was provided by music and theatre arts students.

The STEAM Building is just the first of a number of buildings that the college intends to build or renovate. The $126 million Student Success Center, which will be located at the corner of Ocean Avenue and Frida Kahlo Way, is projected to get approvals from the state soon.

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