2025 Design & Master Plan - South Dakota State University

3.5 pedestrian corridors
freeing the campus core
The recommendations within the 2025 Design and Master Plan support
strengthening the existing ring road by relocating parking to the edge
of campus as the key driver in the efforts to change the physical
characteristics of the campus core. Currently, the geographic center of the
South Dakota State University main campus is an asphalt-surfaced parking
lot west of the University Student Union. This effort to relocate parking
will allow for the establishment of strong pedestrian corridors to connect
campus greens and parking to the interior of campus. Organizing parking
along the ring road frees the campus core for pedestrian traffic and opens
land for building and campus green development.
pedestrian corridors
As interior streets are removed and parking relocated, it is recommended
that the university redefine these former streets as major pedestrian
corridors that connect primary destinations and offer pedestrians a safe,
inviting and relatively direct means of travel across campus. As previously
stated, the 2010 Parking Study determined that the majority of the relocated
parking will be within a three- to five-minute walk of an individual’s final
campus destination.
figure 3.10: concept view of engineering quad
at south end of campus (vacated 12th avenue)
The sidewalk network should consist of a hierarchy constructed with a
consistent material palette that will help define and articulate open spaces
while enhancing campus wayfinding. Major pedestrian pathways should
connect to parking, campus greens and notable gateways at the edge of
campus. Figure 3.12 highlights the suggested major pedestrian corridor
improvements. Developing these corridors is a critical component in the
successful relocation of parking to the edges of campus.
As streets are eliminated from the core of campus, alternative means
of building access will be required for service and emergency vehicles.
Major sections of the pedestrian corridor network should be designed to
accommodate service and emergency vehicle use. Care should be taken
to plan for this vehicular traffic on these sidewalks, yet include elements
such as decorative paving, site furnishings, landscape, campus wayfinding
signage and gathering nodes that suggest a predominantly pedestrian use
of these corridors.
figure 3.11: concept view of medary avenue pedestrian entrance
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