The University of Maryland’s Washington Quad is set to have an outdoor water bottle filling station available for students in the fall.

Most of the South Hill dorms near the quad do not have filtered water bottle-filling stations inside, only offering sinks with unfiltered water. Students in the community had complained about the lack of filtered water throughout the fall semester, said Lucie Roach, the Residence Hall Association’s Residential Facilities Advisory Board chair.

Residential Facilities gave the project the green light in December when it added building the station to its list of campus projects. Project organizers got $5,000 from this university’s sustainability fund, and facilities agreed to cover the other $5,000 needed to build the station.

Construction is planned to begin after spring commencement, and the station is expected to be ready for use by the start of the fall semester.

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The project began in early October when community outcry spurred RHA representatives to ask Residential Facilities whether the community could get water bottle filling stations.

Andrea Crabb, Residential Facilities director, said an indoor filling station wouldn’t be possible, due to the location of the dorms’ plumbing infrastructure and the risk of a station blocking exits during fires. Instead, the department resolved to make an outdoor station.

“It’s a great idea and to me, it’s a great part of working with students in that you tell us what you want and help prioritize some of the projects for us,” Crabb said.

In December, the advisory board sent a letter of support for the project to Cindy Felice, a Residential Facilities associate director. An RHA senator also sent out a Google form to students that live in South Hill, which indicated support for the project. And last month, the RHA approved a resolution to back the initiative with a 25-2 vote.

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Chris Egbunine, a senior communication major who lives in Washington Hall, said he avoids his dorm’s sink water, which means he doesn’t drink as much water as he should. But if there were a water bottle filling station on the quad, he’d use it.

“That’d be really cool. It might be hard to accommodate for all the buildings in the quad,” Egbunine said. “Having one right in the center, we could just go there real quick and get water.”

Carleinni Mendez, a sophomore information systems and finance major, lives in Montgomery Hall and doesn’t drink her dorm’s sink water, usually opting to buy bottled water instead. She also liked the plan to build a station.

“It would save me the walk. I probably don’t drink enough water because there’s not one near me,” Mendez, a sophomore studying business, said. “I definitely feel like I’m dehydrated more often than not.”

Roach said it was “pretty exciting” that the university approved the project.

“It just shows that we are taking steps towards being more sustainable on this campus,” Roach said.