At the U. of Iowa, 2 New Buildings to Make Exercise a Pleasure

A boathouse is one of two new buildings for athletes at the U. of Iowa. (Chronicle photographs by Lawrence Biemiller)

Iowa City — Students at the University of Iowa have some sleek new exercise options. The university’s vast and glassy Campus Recreation and Wellness Center opened in August and offers 215,000 square feet of space for sweaty see-and-be-seen activity at the corner of West Burlington and South Madison Streets. Meanwhile, the university’s rowing teams moved a year ago into a beautiful new boathouse at a bend in the Iowa River near the north end of the campus. The building is so attractive that the first time I drove past it I guessed it must be an art museum.

The recreation center (left), which cost $70-million, was designed by RDG Planning and Design. It houses three floors of fitness equipment overlooking West Burlington Street, in addition to a climbing wall, two basketball courts, and an indoor track. It also has competititon swimming and diving pools, with seats for 2,000 spectators, and a separate, kid-friendly leisure pool with a video screen for showing movies. Since student fees helped finance the building, students can use it without paying anything extra. Faculty and staff members and local residents can buy memberships.

The 20,000-square-foot boathouse was designed by Neumann Monson Architects and cost $7.2-million. It has four boat-storage bays, locker rooms, and a community room and terrace for use by either university or community groups. It also houses a room for rowing machines and a tank in which rowers can practice as water flows past at adjustable speeds. The building, which is designed to withstand flooding, has geothermal heating and cooling and is the university’s first building designed for LEED certification.

The recreation center fills an entire city block.

The design highlight of the boathouse is a prow-like point on one end of the building.

The boathouse is designed so that floodwaters can flow through it and cause only minimal damage.