TEXAS STATE UNIVERSITY
Just like the city of San Marcos has the Comprehensive Plan to help guide and shape growth and highlight major goals for the town, so too does one of its largest institutions — Texas State University. The university recently gave a presentation to San Marcos City Council during a work session regarding the 2025 to 2035 Campus Master Plan.
According to city documents, in mid-2023, Texas State University selected a consultant to lead the revision of the Campus Master Plan, and the process began with discovery, followed by engagement and then planning. Both San Marcos Mayor Jane Hughson and San Marcos City Manager Stephanie Reyes were on the Texas State Master Plan Committee, which served in an advisory role and met throughout the process. A draft of the plan was given to the city in Spring of 2024, and feedback was provided. The public were given a preview of the plan on Dec. 5 in the JC Kellam Ballroom. The plan will be presented to the Texas State University System Board of Regents in February 2025.
The Texas State presentation stated that the plan “presents a comprehensive vision for the future across seven of the university’s locations, encompassing the San Marcos Campus, Round Rock Campus, STAR Park, ALERRT Facility, Freeman Ranch, Muller Farm and University Camp. This plan addresses a range of pri- ority topics, each thoroughly explored to develop recommendations and strategies that will propel TXST forward over the next decade.”
Dan Costello, TXST Facilities, Planning, Design and Construction associate vice president, gave the presentation to the city council and discussed the university’s “run to R1,” referring to the term used by the “Carnegie Foundation to categorize doctoral granting universities with the highest performance in key areas associated with Research and Development,” according to the North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University website.
“We also added some themes with community connectivity. We looked at transportation. We looked at the boundary areas within our communities,” Costello said. “We always want to make sure we are looking at the environment and being good stewards of our resources.”
Costello said the university is projecting enrollment growth to go from approximately 40,000 students to 50,000.
“Most of that growth is in the Round Rock Campus where we show going from almost a thousand students to 10,000 students. Some of that is the result of moving to some four-year programs at the Round Rock campus in lieu of some of the twoyear programs we offer now,” Costello said. “A good bit of that is our global campus, which is online. You can see the increase for the San Marcos campus is relatively moderate, going from about 37,000 or 38,000 to 40,000 students.”
Costello said currently, there are a little over 10,000 beds on campus.
“You can see that we’re projecting about a 1,500 bed shortfall in 2027,” Costello said. “We already have a project programmed for that. We’ve got a request for qualifications out now for architectural firms. … Shortly, we will be advertising for the construction manager for that project with the intent of offering dining and housing in 2027.”
Eric Algoe, TXST Operations executive vice president, said the current directive from the TSUS Board of Regents and statewide for all universities is to grow significantly.
“When you look at the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Boards goal to educate at least 60% of Texans with some postsecondary degree, it would require every institution of higher education in the state to double in size,” Algoe said. “Our primary focus in that is by growing online, growing in Round Rock [and] growing in partnership with community colleges. … So our focus is less about growing San Marcos because I think we start to run out of space physically, and as Dan said, we have no plans to continue to try to grow or buy land in San Marcos.”
Gordon Bohmfalk, TXST Facilities, Planning, Design and Construction director, said there will be many improvements between Old Main and J.C. Kellam in order to increase connectivity and ability for faculty and students to gather in those areas. West campus will have some improvements to student circulation and the Recreation Center.
“The STEM Building is under construction,” Bohmfalk said. “We are working on the foundation as we speak.”
Bohmfalk said there is an “exciting” vision for Spring Lake, including the building of the Indigenous Cultures Institute. They are hoping to expand the trail system in that area as well.
“A lot of improvements here for trails and things like that,” Bohmfalk said. “We’re trying to move a lot of the hardscape and get back to nature and get back to native plants.”
As for Sessom Drive and Sewell Park, the university is proposing to replace the bridge that runs over the river on Aquarena Springs. They plan to replace some of the headwalls that have been damaged as well as adding connections to the city trails.
Watch the full presentation at this link
