This year more freshmen than usual will become acquainted with the Bursley-Baits bus.

A large increase in students who accepted their Fall 2010 admission left University Housing scrambling to accommodate a freshman class larger than ever before and resulted in the creation of the Northwood Houses, the first entirely new freshmen residence hall in almost forty years.

University Housing spokesman Peter Logan said that despite algorithms used by the admissions office to estimate class size, the number was larger than they originally anticipated by about 400 students. About 240 of those extra students will be housed on North Campus this year.

“It created for us a challenge to accommodate any one of these freshmen who wanted to be placed in University housing,” he said.

The problem was intensified because Couzens Hall, traditionally reserved for freshmen students, is closed for renovations and the newly completed North Quadrangle is only housing upperclassmen.

“Because of the number of bed spaces unavailable to us, we got creative and did a lot of brainstorming within Housing at the Division of Student Affairs,” Logan said.

He said Housing officials decided to convert staff offices in Oxford Housing back to student rooms, as well as repurposing smaller lounges in other residence halls, a strategy used in the past when the University was at full capacity. Together, these efforts successfully placed 160 residents, leaving University officials wondering how to accommodate close to 240 other students.

“The option that made the most sense was creating a first-year community out of three apartment buildings in Northwood,” Logan said. “So we identified three buildings that were adjacent to each other and basically had them furnished like any residence hall.”

He added that most residents placed in the new housing had indicated that they wanted to live on North Campus in their housing application.

Unlike many freshmen residence halls, each Northwood unit is equipped with a kitchen and bathroom. The three buildings share outdoor common spaces, like small gazebos and picnic tables, as well as a common laundry area and indoor lounge equipped with wireless Internet access. Despite the distinctive layout, the residence hall is staffed just like any other dormitory and outfitted with the same modular furniture.

Because University Housing held to the move-in date they announced, the new hall was prepared very quickly, with additional plumbing and carpentry, fire and safety system testing and the addition of wireless access all completed by the end of the summer.

After the extensive preparation, Logan said there was a lot of excitement surrounding the opening of the new living option.

“This was something of a bold step for us because we had not placed first-year students in apartment-type living arrangements before,” he said.

Though officials were excited to offer the non-traditional accommodations, Logan said a major concern was maintaining a sense of community in the apartment setting.

“We don’t want to place first-year students into an isolated situation like an apartment,” Logan said. “But, after creating a contiguous community and then programming it and staffing it, we think it will be an interesting living arrangement.”

In addition, because Housing officials view the dining experience as an essential part of campus integration, each student is required to have a meal plan, Logan said. Accordingly, many of the residents eat their meals across the street at Bursley Hall.

Engineering sophomore Aaron Frantz, vice president for finance of the Residence Hall Association, said he’s unsure how successful the separate houses will be at fostering a strong community.

“As separate apartments those buildings were designed so that you could have your own personal space in your own little corner on North Campus,” he said.