The Politehnica University in Bucharest (UPB), one of the largest in South-East Europe and the biggest engineering school in Romania, has started to build a new student dorm in the Regie area of the capital.

Benefiting from the support of the government’s National Investment Company (CNI), the university will build a 700-bed dorm within the next two years. The building will have ten floors and 350 rooms in total. Each floor will have a lecture hall, a washer and a drier room, kitchenettes, and a mess hall.

The new dorm will also have underground parking and facilities for disabled students. Twenty rooms will be specially designed for the latter. Its hot water will be provided by solar panels and the building’s façade will be energy-efficient.

“We’ve been receiving more and more requests for accommodation in recent years. 75% of the over 30,000 students in our university are from outside Bucharest. An increasing number of students, higher rents, and the degree of comfort in dorms motivated us to continuously attract funds for the construction of new accommodation spaces and the renovation of existing ones,” Mihnea Costoiu, rector of UPB, said in a press release.

Costoiu explained that the new dorm will be integrated within the Smart City concept, meaning that it will be energy-efficient and highly digitalized when it comes to its administration.

The total value of the new student dorm stands at EUR 24.4 mln.

UPB already built a new 500-seat mess hall and is currently renovating two other student dorms this year. The university paid EUR 4 mln out of its own funds for the three projects. Another investment worth EUR 1.7 mln went toward the campus’ internet infrastructure. Yet another student dorm is under construction at the moment, an investment of EUR 5 mln.

UPB currently operates 29 student dorms and offers accommodation for 12,000 students.

radu@romania-insider.com

(Photo source: George Calin | Inquam Photos)