When students returned to campus this semester, many were surprised to find a grassy mound near the edge of Mertz Lawn — the same pile of dirt left behind by last semester’s construction work. The pile wasn’t neglected; instead, it was carefully enclosed by a plastic mesh fence for protection, leaving students wondering about its purpose.
“[It just became] this big green hill in front of our dorm,” said Mertz Hall resident Laine Chen ’28.
The mound was not the only change people noticed on the campus lawns. A few weeks after classes began, the grass on a large section of Mertz Lawn died off. Those areas were soon fenced off and spray coated with a bright bluish sage-colored powder. On the lawn between Magill Walk and the back door of the Dining and Community Center (DCC), a muddy pond emerged after a recent rain. Meanwhile, on the enclosed Parrish Lawn, excavators have been digging deep into the ground behind construction barriers.
Andrew Feick, associate vice president for sustainable facilities operations and capital planning, explained each of these phenomena in an email to The Phoenix. According to Feick, the changes to campus lawns are all related to the well-drilling construction that paves the way for a gradual shift from the combustion steam plant to a new geoexchange plant — the key component of Swarthmore’s “To Zero by Thirty-Five” (20X35) project.
The pile of dirt in front of Mertz Hall is composed of the topsoil removed from the wellfield construction site on Parrish Lawn, and the grass on it was intentionally planted to prevent water erosion and soil loss.
Currently, workers are not only drilling wells on Parrish Lawn, but also connecting the wells with lateral pipes, which converge at a zone manifold that connects the wells to the geoexchange plant. Once construction is complete, the manifolds will be entirely underground and covered by the lawn, with only a 6×6-inch concrete pad and a manhole remaining for maintenance and inspection. By then, the topsoil will be restored to the site, allowing the lawn to be graded and seeded either this winter or next spring.
Regarding the location of the stockpile, Feick said that it was hauled onto Mertz Lawn because wellfield zones five-seven, currently undergoing construction on Parrish Lawn, don’t have enough space to stock it. Unlike the construction last semester on Mertz Lawn, these zones were separately fenced in three sites, each confined and sloped. Additionally, the college tries to keep it as close as its original site in order to save hauling costs, making Mertz Lawn the most suitable location to store it.
The well drilling on Mertz Lawn was completed last semester, and its construction site was reseeded. However, the lawn failed to be established over this summer as grass died from a fungal infection resulting from the humid spring.
“Established turf areas that may have been affected by the fungus were strong enough to withstand it. New lawn areas did not have grass with a robust enough root system to withstand the fungus, so it died,” Feick said. Thus, the area has been fenced, reseeded, and treated with fungicide since around the Fall Break, and the grass has now begun to grow back.
The ongoing construction on Parrish Lawn also caused the water pond on the lawn near the DCC. During well drilling, groundwater sometimes rises to the surface. After passing through sedimentation trailers on site to let suspended particles settle out, the water is discharged to the pond to be absorbed back into the ground. “Any excess sediment will be removed from the pond at the conclusion of well field construction,” Feick noted.
While acknowledging the relationship between the construction and changes to campus lawns, Feick said that the restoration of the lawns is weather-dependent.
“We are down to just a few more wells to drill, and then all the drill rigs will be gone. The laterals, manifolds, site grading, and seeding work I described above will last until spring. If we get a decent summer for establishing the lawn, then we hope the fenced areas can reopen for the fall.”
