BRUNSWICK

Bowdoin College is trying to keep more students living on-campus by building four new residence halls on Park Row.

The college’s proposal will be presented to the Brunswick Planning Board tonight.

Each of the residence halls will be approximately 3,900 square feet, and will be located in the zoning district designated for college growth. The estimated cost of the project is $15.25 million.

Matt Orlando, Bowdoin College senior vice president, said the apartment-style residence halls would be constructed at the southern end of Park Row, just east of Chamberlain Hall. The Gustafson House, an administrative building, will be demolished to make way for the new housing.

“We’re trying to design these buildings so they’ll fit in the neighborhood on Park Row and across from Maine Street,” Orlando said.

The three-story, energy-efficient buildings will house 88 upperclassmen.

“This is a carefully thought-out process,” Orlando said, adding there is no plan to increase student enrollment.

He said the upperclassmen living off campus peaked at 217 last year. To find out why, a working group took a closer look at the college’s housing situation.

“Bottom line, we weren’t offering the type of housing students desired — apartment-style living with single bedrooms and large common areas for students to gather and socialize with friends,” Orlando said.

While the college offers apartments, the majority of those have shared double or triple bedrooms.

“So students were choosing to live off campus because students could find those layouts off campus pretty easily,” Orlando said.

Orlando said students were critical of how the existing apartment-style housing had been maintained.

“They’ve been maintained well past their shelf life,” he said, “so with the new houses we’re going to do, we’ll be able to take a couple apartment complexes offline, renovate and rebuild.”

Orlando expects the next projects will center on Harpswell Apartments and Brunswick Apartments. There are also plans to turn the 1849 Boody-Johnson House into student housing.

If all goes according to plan, construction could start in September.

“This is not a shoot-from-the-hip type of decision,” Orlando stressed. “This is something we’ve been studying for many, many months and getting input on from the Bowdoin community.”

Other business

The planning board will also discuss a sketch plan for a one-story, 5,140-square-foot medical office building at 191-209 Bath Road, proposed by Brunswick Bath LLC. The property for the proposed project is currently owned by Crooker Enterprises and the Maine Department of Transportation. The building would house ConvenientMD, which operates urgent care centers.

According to planning documents, the project area has remained in a developed state since before 1940. There are 43 parking spaces planned, which exceeds the minimum requirement, but was included in anticipation of another tenant at the east-end of the site.

The planning board will also consider a proposal by Stephanie Schmitt to divide the property she owns at 17 Stone Ridge Drive within the Crestview Estates subdivision, into two residential lots.

The planning board meeting starts at 7 p.m. in council chambers at Town Hall.