Construction of a future student dining room ate up a chunk of the Brickyard this week, ahead of the Atrium’s partial reopening this fall.

Crews fenced off an area in front of the Atrium and began building the “Brickyard bubble” this week, said Jennifer Gilmore of University Dining marketing and communications.

Resembling a large inflatable tent, the bubble will offer climate-controlled indoor seating for students eating near the Atrium and will be the main indoor eating area until the Atrium reopens in the fall of 2011   

Although a much larger area of the Brickyard had to be fenced off for construction of the bubble, Gilmore said the actual structure will only be 50 feet by 80 feet when finished.

The opening of the bubble is scheduled to coincide with the partial reopening of the Atrium this fall. The service half of the building will reopen when classes begin Aug. 18, and students will be able to buy food from Chick-fil-A or Lil’ Dino’s during the first semester. However, there will be no seating inside the Atrium for the upcoming academic year.

For the fall and spring semesters, students can “go through line in the new Atrium, get their food and sit in the bubble to eat,” Gilmore said. The bubble will have electricity, sprinklers, heating and air conditioning, she said.   

Students who want an outside eating option will still be able to use many of the tables and chairs in front of the Atrium while construction is underway.   

Chick-fil-A and Lil’ Dino’s will open on the seating side of the Atrium while crews work on the service side this fall. In January, the service side will open and work will begin on the seating area, but students will still be eating in the bubble.

“We could have shut the Atrium down completely, but we did it in phases to ensure uninterrupted food service for students,” Gilmore said, and added that Atrium receipts often reflect around 30,000 people being served daily.    

Gilmore also said students can take advantage of other dining options, such as those in D.H. Hill Library. Hill of Beans and the Creamery will serve sandwiches, pitas and wraps under the new Wolfpack-to-Go label at both establishments.

While culinary choices near the Atrium will be limited in the fall, several new dining options will appear for the spring semester.

“If all goes as scheduled, all of our new [Atrium] food concepts should be open in January,” Gilmore said.

The University will follow this plan for the 2010-2011 fall and spring semesters, then shut the Atrium down completely next summer to complete the project.

“We’ll have to close [the Atrium] down again to tie in the air conditioning, vents and sprinkler system, as well as renovate the back kitchen,” Gilmore said. “But when August 2011 rolls around, everything will be open and the bubble will be gone.”