Fix in for cold dorms: Software glitch repaired in new UMass complex

Daily Hampshire Gazette - February 14, 2007
By Kristin Palpini

AMHERST - University of Massachusetts officials say a problem with the heating control system at the new North Residential Area apartments has been fixed. But on Tuesday, students weren't so sure the issue is resolved.

"Today my thermostat says 67 degrees and that's pretty good, but I don't think it's accurate," said Sylvia T. Das Chagas, a UMass junior who lives in the D building of the apartment complex.

"They'll come and fix it and then for a week it will be OK, but then it's just cold again," Das Chagas said.

The North Residential Area apartments consist of four multi-story buildings that were opened to 864 students in September.

The $92.9 million complex was built over the course of a year by Dimeo Construction Co., of Providence, R.I., and its subcontractors.

Since around November, students housed at the apartments have been complaining about a lack of heat, Das Chagas said. However, on Tuesday morning, the temperature inside the D building's lobby was comfortable and the thermostat read 72.1 degrees.

Students have also complained about cold air blowing with extreme force from their heating vents.

"It sounds like a wind storm, it blows the posters off the walls," said a UMass junior who lives in the D building and declined to provide her last name.

Students living in the apartments pay the highest room and board rate on the campus. A room in a four-bedroom apartment costs a student $6,750 a year.

"There's a bit of a wind-chill factor in there now," said Michael R. Malloy, a UMass economics major who also lives in D building, "You pay so much money for this place, but I guess the university is trying to fix it."

Despite ongoing student complaints, James E. Cahill, director of facilities and campus planning at UMass, said the heating problem at the apartments has been repaired.

Cahill said the problem stemmed from a software issue within the heating-control system.

He said the system was still under warranty. Last Friday, Johnson Controls Inc., which has its corporate headquarters in Milwaukee, Wisc., downloaded new software that remedied the problem.

"That's news to me," Cahill said of recent student complaints. "I heard we weren't getting any more calls complaining about the heat."

Cahill said he became aware of the heating problem two weeks ago.

"The contractor was very responsive and came right in," Cahill said.

"This is all part of shaking a building out. You run into these kinds of problems, they aren't unusual in the first year of operation in a building with all new equipment."