New Campus Site of the American University in Cairo

The new faculty orientation included a visit to the site of the campus for AUC. Construction is underway at the new site, and the university plans to move itself there in the summer of 2007. The site is 35 km east of the current location downtown. What started as a location in the desert is now being developed into a planned city of New Cairo. This will eventually be a city of 4 million in an area about the same as Cairo (which has a population of near 20 million). The AUC campus will be an important feature of the new community. We explored the mile and a half long service tunnel. This tunnel will provide a route for equipment and supplies to all the buildings, as well as utility lines, without requiring vehicle traffic on the surface. Details of the planning and design of this large project are at new campus web site.



Entrance to the new campus.

Since it's a construction site, we all wore hard hats.

Sand and more sand.

Down into the tunnel.

The temperature was quite comfortable in the tunnel.

Housing will be a short walk across the road from the campus.