NAIT has broken ground on the largest capital project in the Edmonton college’s history.
The 625,000-square-foot Advanced Skills Centre is set to be completed fall 2030, adding space for an additional 5,500 new trades students.
NAIT says some of its older trades facilities were built decades ago for specific program needs, but the ASC is designed with flexible and shared learning environments.
The college says that will make it easier to adapt training spaces and styles as industry tools, technologies, and workforce needs evolve.
Once done, the centre will be home to 29 NAIT programs teaching trades and skills in the fields of construction, transportation, manufacturing and energy.
The expansion will increase the technical college’s capacity to more than 15,000 students each year.
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The school says it aims to offer training that matches job sites where trades work together, with the 29 programs organized into “connected communities so students learn alongside one another —building the coordination and collaboration skills employers expect.”
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The $779-million project on the north end of the main campus was designed by Toronto-based Architecture firm Dialoog, and is being built by Edmonton’s PCL Construction.
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The ASC moved into early construction roughly a year ahead of schedule, NAIT said, thanks to $384 million from the Alberta government in this year’s provincial budget.
The province provided 75 per cent of the funding, with NAIT financing the rest.
Construction is taking place where the former ETS Westwood Bus Barn used to be, which shut down in 2020 when the newer Kathleen Andrews Transit Garage opened on Fort Road.
Katherine Ludwig has more in the video above.
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