A Master Plan for the Campus

This is the 1988 Campus Master Plan for the University of Pennsylvania. Its aim is both to provide direction on a wide range of immediate and short range problems, and to serve the longer range needs for growth and change: to provide a vision of Penn's future. Like the plans which have preceded it, this plan must be seen as part of a continuing process, providing a framework for development while it remains responsive to the real needs of the community it is to serve. Penn's campus must be capable of encompassing growth and change over time; thus, a master plan designed to guide development must also be flexible, able to respond to future changes in the University's priorities and assumptions. Specific designs and solutions can only serve to illustrate the concepts and recommendations contained in the plan. The University is a diverse and complex community with a population of approximately 40,000. Any physical plan for this community, if it is to be truly useful, must address the varied needs of all its members, while recognizing that their various pursuits are interrelated. This plan addresses both the needs for space in which to live and work, and the more abstract needs for a sense of community and an identifiable image. The visionary model of the campus of the future presented by the 1998 Campus Master Plan is the necessary framework around which the components of an operational plan for guiding specific development actions are structured. That vision is based upon real opportunities for bold changes which can occur if the University lends its active support. It also recognizes the physical and political limitations of the campus' surroundings, as well as the many positive qualities of the existing campus. But it is not limited by what is in place, nor is it a working drawing for past policies and plans. It is designed to remain flexible, allowing for change, within an overall plan concept, a campus order, aimed at an ideal future.