At San Diego Mesa College, the Measure HH bond program is taking shape with a new Performing Arts and Administration Center designed to enrich and elevate arts programs serving Mesa students for generations to come.
Through a collaborative design-build partnership with PCL Construction, HGA is designing a five-story complex nestled into the north hillside near the Student Services Center, creating a more prominent and accessible connection between the lower parking area and the main Mesa level of the campus.
The project will serve as a new campus gateway from the north and will consolidate the performing arts programs into a single destination, offering performance venues and instructional/support spaces for Dramatic Arts, Music, and Dance. The building will also house Mesa College’s World Art Gallery artifact collection, as well as a dedicated multi-level Administration suite for campus leadership. In addition, the project features a separate parking structure situated directly adjacent to the Performing Arts and Administration Center that will serve the needs of the facility and expand the college’s parking capacity for campus events and daily use. Equipped with a photovoltaic solar panel array, the structure will also further the District’s sustainability and energy performance initiatives.
Given the project’s scale and the site’s unique topography, early collaboration has played an important role in the design process. HGA, PCL, and the District are working closely with students, faculty, campus leadership, and safety teams to better understand future needs and priorities at Mesa College, gleaning insights to guide conversations around equity, accessibility, safety, comfort, instructional workflows, event needs, and students’ overall sense of belonging and targeted pathways to academic success.
Mirroring the building’s programmatic intricacies, the topographic variation of the site has presented another layer of complexity. To navigate the numerous challenges of a steep hillside site, the team has employed a multitude of tools such as drone photography and point cloud data to more effectively document detailed aspects of the existing conditions. These tools allow for streamlined coordination and documentation, as well as clearer communication of design ideas to stakeholders.
With HGA and PCL working hand-in-hand from the earliest stages of the project’s inception, conceptual design thinking has been evaluated and shaped though lenses of constructability, cost, schedule, phasing, and campus operations. This early alignment of project factors unlocked by the collaborative design-build process has afforded the team the acumen needed to mitigate potential challenges and balance aspiration with pragmatism.
Over the next several years, the project will continue moving through design, DSA approval, construction, and move-in milestones. The Parking Structure and surrounding site is anticipated to be completed by Fall 2028, with the Performing Arts and Administration Center expected to follow in Fall of 2030.
Video courtesy of San Diego Community College District, highlighting early engagement for the San Diego Mesa College Performing Arts Center.