Yale School of Management Project Wends Its Way Through New Haven Governance

Last week New Haven's Board of Alderman's Legislation Committee approved the proposed plan for the new Yale School of Management building. The plan had been previously approved by the City Plan Commission. Its next step is the full Board of Alderman.
This article is illuminating about the procedural steps a private institution may need to take when looking for permission for large capital projects.

Dickson, who is a Yale School of Architecture graduate, voiced a common theme of opponents: That the 237,000 square-foot building is “one giant box” and “out of scale” with the neighborhood.

There were spirited calls for downsizing, for opening the courtyard to the public on the Whitney side, for shifting delivery and driveways to the north side; and queries as to whether Yale had truly considered adaptive reuse of the buildings at 155 and 175 Whitney, which it plans to demolish to build the new home.

Presenting a Power Point and bird’s eye views of the site showing a structure lording it over the area, Farwell also questioned the accuracy of Yale’s submitted drawings and whether Yale’s outreach to the community for its input was “limited to the abutting area [only], not the impact area.”

Yale’s chief planner for the project, Laura Cruickshank, said Farwell’s bird’s eye views were misleading. They were for birds, she said. There were no people in them. First and foremost, she said, a building must work, not only look elegant, and the SOM as presented does. SOM professors and a dean described a crying need for a single, consolidating structure for its far-flung educational units and expansion by 100 students.

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Regional SCUP Events! Enjoy the F2F company of your colleagues and peers at one of three SCUP regional conferences this spring:

• March 14–16: Baltimore, MD
• March 24–26: Cambridge, MA
• April 5–7, San Diego, CA