The chemistry building at De Dreijen. WUR has sold its former campus, De Dreijen. The company Gebroeders Blokland Ontwikkeling en Bouw will be building 550 homes on the 11-hectare site. That may require the demolition of all the existing buildings.
But that won’t be for a couple of years yet, says Facilities & Services director Harold Swartjes. All the stakeholders (the municipality, WUR, the project developer and the housing corporation) have agreed the prerequisites for the construction of 550 homes in a range of categories. The design still has to be finalized.
According to Swartjes, the agreement with the project developer doesn’t say anything about maintaining objects of cultural value. ‘We sold the land including the buildings. Nothing was excluded. However, together with the project developer we will look at what is worth giving a new place. I don’t think we will be talking about an entire building, though.’
Purchase price
Various buildings have already been demolished (Biotechnion, Transitorium). Students live in the old Chemistry Building; they can stay there for now. Swartjes: ‘At the start of this year, we agreed new rental contracts with the students for a period until summer 2027. So nothing will happen before then anyway. We expect the transfer of the land to take place at the end of 2027 at the earliest.’
Until then, there will be no announcements about the purchase price. According to Swartjes, the proceeds will not have any effect on the savings operation WUR is currently undertaking. ‘Those proceeds are already accounted for in the construction of the current campus. Anyway, the savings operation is needed to bring about a permanent reduction in the budget whereas the revenue from the sale is a one-off. You can’t simply say those numbers cancel one another out.’ The current sale doesn’t apply to all of De Dreijen, as the section on the north-west side had already been sold. Work will start soon there on the construction of 80 homes.
