Eco-friendly Kline Center Opens to Students

CARLISLE, Pa. — Opened this month, the renovation and expansion at Dickinson College’s Kline Center in Carlisle offers students an athletic center that combines fitness amenities with sustainable architecture.

The 29,000-square-foot facility accommodates the increased demand for fitness space, workout studios, squash courts, athletic offices, a basketball arena, locker rooms and a natatorium. New York-based Cannon Design designed the $14 million athletic center to achieve LEED Gold certification, and it will be the fifth LEED Gold building on campus. The structure is surrounded by rain gardens and bioswales, which are designed to gather rainwater for hydrophilic plants, reducing the amount of water that enters the stormwater system. The stormwater enters the sewer, which eventually leads to the Chesapeake Bay.
“This is one of the most effective stormwater management projects I’ve ever worked on,” said Scott Noble, Dickinson’s director of capital projects, planning and construction, in a statement. Extra outdoor gathering space also was created by moving the stormwater collection pond underground, according to Noble.
Inside the building is flooded with indirect natural light. Windows and a skylight running through the main corridor gets light down to the first floor by creating light wells. The curtain-wall design of the building reduces the amount of lighting needed, while energy-saving LEDs operate wherever lighting is needed.
For ventilation, ceiling vents push or pull air in and out of the building. Ceiling vents scattered throughout the fitness rooms open up, and reversible fans allow for natural ventilation in the spring and fall. Low windows along the perimeter allow for increased circulation, while a central chase, or channel, provides natural ventilation for the entire building, as the intake is on the floor level and the air flows up to the equipment upstairs.
To draw students outside, the facility offers an outdoor stretching patio. The perimeter screen is one of the Kline Center expansion’s energy-saving features, as it greatly decreases the amount of direct sunlight on the building, thereby cutting down on heat gain.
“The building does a lot of the work that mechanical elements traditionally must handle,” said Ken Shultes, associate vice president of campus operations. "All these pieces taken together make the building more environmentally friendly, and the architects did an amazing job of integrating these elements into the design.”
Dickinson is a private liberal arts college with 2,339 full-time students. The Princeton Review has named the college to its Green Honor Roll, and the college has received the Stars Gold rating from the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education. Dickinson has also earned top marks on the Green Report Card of the Sustainable Endowments Institute, as well as Second Nature’s inaugural award for Institutional Excellence in Climate Leadership.