There is no quick way to encompass all that the nearly $80 million Rams Head Center is designed to be and do.

CAROLINA’S CHANGING LANDSCAPE  The grassy roof of the Rams Head Center provides an easier walk between south and north campus and is also a destination unto itself with its dining facilities and recreation center.

Jonathan Howes finds a simpler way to explain the building is to tell you what it is not.  “It is not your father’s parking deck,” said Howes, who, as special assistant to the chancellor, helped coordinate the campus master planning process that led to its construction.

It sits inconspicuously along Kenan Stadium’s eastern flank, rising out of a deep gulley that previously had been filled with a surface parking lot.

The 700-space garage is inconspicuous because of its roof, which consists of a grassy plaza with wide, brick-lined walkways. On one side of the plaza facing Ridge Road is a two-story brick structure that houses a dining hall and a sports café called The End Zone. On the side of the plaza bordering the stadium is a two-story recreation center.

Because of the bowl-shaped gulley over which it extends, the plaza serves as a grade-level bridge for anyone walking there from South Road. That single feature may be the most distinctive about the complex, and one that has produced the multiple benefits that has made it a linchpin project of the campus master plan.

Now, instead of navigating steep hills, walkers, bikers and the wheelchair bound traverse a vegetated plaza constructed on top of a three-level parking deck. Eventually, 20 acres of surface parking will disappear from campus and be replaced by 10 acres of new buildings — including parking decks — and 10 acres of new green space.

“When you stand up there on the on the plaza and look around at the building, you are standing on connective tissue in the campus master plan that connects north and south campus on a level walking route,” Howes said.

Of course, the Rams Head Center is also designed as a destination point where students come together to eat, to play, to work out or just to hang out. The dining hall opened last month, along with a grocery store on the ground level of the garage facing Ridge Road. The recreation center, which will open this summer, will feature three basketball courts, an elevated indoor track and more than 70 fitness machines, along with a two-story climbing wall and an aerobics room.

Howes said the beauty of the project, from a purely aesthetic point of view, is that it replaced an unsightly patch of asphalt with an architectural jewel melded to its natural surroundings.

From a practical point of view, the deck also provides twice the number of parking spaces as the lot it replaced.

But beyond a place to park cars, the Rams Head Center is part of the far-reaching goal of creating the same level of social vibrancy and natural beauty to south campus that already exists on north campus in quads such as McCorkle Place and Polk Place.  

A plan takes shape
Carolyn Elfland, associate vice chancellor for Campus Services, said the development of the dining hall and grocery store stems from an extensive planning process that began in 1995 to improve dining services that didn’t get high marks from anybody.

A food consultant was hired to work with a task force of about 30 people to seek improvements. A campuswide survey was completed, and focus groups were formed to identify specific eating preferences.

The Rams Head dining hall, Elfland said, was designed to address many of the concerns raised in that earlier study.

Each location has its own ambience and atmosphere. Walk into the Carolina Diner and it’s like stepping back to Mel’s Diner in “Happy Days.” Besides the cushioned booths, the checkered floor and the stainless steel tables with the Formica tops, there’s even a jukebox in the corner like the one Fonzie used to kick-start with his fist.

The Barraca’s Pizza, Pasta and Deli is reminiscent of an Italian restaurant.

The Lean & Green offers light colors and a natural wood floor to match the light, natural food.

The Chop House, in contrast, features dark, heavy wood tables, elegant lighting and has the look of a high-priced steakhouse — minus the high prices.

The overall effect is to jettison the sameness of a cafeteria’s look and food and produce something that can appeal to anyone’s taste.

To top off any meal with almost any dessert, there is The Rolling Pine that features homemade desserts, breads and parfaits along with coffees, cappuccinos and ice cream.

“I think the results are spectacular,” Elfland said. “I’ve been told by a number of the food service professionals who attended the opening dinner that ‘UNC has taken college dining to a whole new level.’”

Ira Simon, the director of food and vending services, said it was Elfland who was a driving force in the design of the dining hall.

“It was really Carolyn who said, ‘There will be cooking in every station,’” Simon said. “She recognized that demand for fresh-prepared food. Students today are more interested in seeing what they are getting, having it prepared in front of them and getting their food the way they want it. We’re able to do that with something like this.”

Campus administrators worked with designers from Ricca Newmark Design, a hospitality design firm, to develop the multiple themes in cuisine and décor features in the dining hall.

The same team worked together to ensure that a grocery store was built on the ground floor, even after Harris Teeter withdrew from the project after space for the store was already in design.

The 6,500 square-foot grocery store is really more of a mini-market, designed for people on the go whose schedules often require them to eat on the run, Simon said.

The Ram’s Head Market features an organic food section, as well as a Boar’s Head deli, a Java City coffee stand where you can grind your own beans and a hot bar featuring take-out meals from the dining hall.

Aramark, the same company that has the University’s food services contract, operates the Rams Head Market.

Simon said the market serves the needs of some 8,000 students in nearby residence halls. The location is important, Simon said, because many students do not have cars and the closest grocery store off campus is three miles away.

The End Zone, Simon said, was an idea that was generated by Mike Freeman, the director of auxiliary services.

 “It was really Mike’s brainchild to create the End Zone, and it was finally accepted because of its ability to create a destination for students to socialize, to meet and greet — without alcohol,” Simon said. Freeman said he got the idea while visiting a sports bar near the Baltimore harbor.

Elfland said the complex, taken as a whole, addresses one of the goals of the campus master plan to more closely link the north and south campuses so that students living in the growing number of new or renovated residence halls on the south campus would not feel like they were living in a “bedroom community” apart from the buzz and whirl of campus life.

With the Rams Head Center, students living on south campus have a variety of amenities and services that will help south campus to “become a real community, and a destination in itself, rather than just a place to sleep,” Elfland said.

Staff and faculty will find that the Rams Head dining facility is the best value around, Elfland said.

 “There is a huge variety of food, the ingredients are all the finest, they can eat as much as they want, they can easily get in and out within a one-hour lunch period and the cost is very reasonable, especially considering the variety and quality of food,” Elfland said. “I would encourage everyone to try it just once, because if they do, I know they will want to return.”  

What lies beneath
The Rams Head project also stands as a testament to the University’s commitment to incorporate the best stormwater management practices available, said Cindy Pollock Shea, the University’s sustainability coordinator.

The “green roof” on top of the parking deck is designed to absorb and reuse rainwater rather than allow it run off into streams and underground water tables.

Rain that falls on the dining hall and recreation center will drain into a trough, or cistern, that underlies the walkway along the perimeter of the plaza. Stormwater storage will also occur under the planted surfaces in a 16-inch, honeycombed layer of interlocking, recycled plastic cups. A central water storage area is located under the intersection of the X-shaped walkway.

Water stored under the plaza will irrigate the plantings — including trees — and eventually evaporate back into the atmosphere, Shea said.

An overflow drainage outlet empties onto a vegetated swale that slopes down to Ehringhaus Field. This field, used as a temporary parking and staging area during the Rams Head construction, will be returned to recreational use. A stormwater storage and infiltration bed has already been installed under the topsoil and sod to come. A surface stream will run along the perimeter of the field under the seeps of the forested hillside.

The $79.6 million project took longer to complete and cost more to build than expected, but Elfland sees the project as a success.

The project was financed through a combination of funding sources, including $6.3 million from the higher education bond referendum and a $5 million donation from the Education Foundation Inc. that was offered in exchange for parking privileges for its members during football games. The bulk of the project was paid for through revenue bonds that will be repaid through a combination of student recreational fees, parking receipts and receipts from the grocery story and dining hall.

“It took longer to design and construct than we had anticipated, but in hindsight, it’s not possible to build five projects rolled into one — dining, recreation, parking, stormwater management and utilities — in the same amount of time that one project can be constructed,” Elfland said.

“The Rams Head Center is the first mixed-use project the University ever has constructed and we learned quite a bit about mixed-use projects that will serve us well in the future,” Elfland said.