Iowa State will receive the street addresses that staff, students, faculty and even delivery services desire.

Cathy Brown, program manager of Facilities Planning and Management, said many departments across campus are involved in this plan to implement the new addresses.

Some of the departments included are the Department of Residence, landscape design, parcel and postal, computer support, Department of Public Safety and campus services.

Brown said even some parking lots and recreational fields are going to have addresses for emergency response purposes. All buildings will officially have a campus address implemented at the beginning of the spring semester.

John Hoffman, systems analyst, will be in charge of implementing this new project in the Google Maps format. Hoffman is the Google Maps regional representative for this specific area and will use a program called “Map Maker” to ensure the university is well represented in Google Maps as well as by the U.S. Postal Service.

Hoffman is currently in the process of putting Iowa State’s campus accurately into Google Maps, which includes drawing in buildings, sidewalks and streets. 

Hoffman said it is a fun, yet difficult project as it is hard to keep up with the changes of sidewalks and construction projects. He works with landscape design to ensure he is up to date on all of the changes around campus and keep the map as accurate as possible.

Printing Services in Memorial Union is also a major part of this program because it will have to change all of the letter headers and business cards for all of campus. This change will not happen until the current supplies run out in order to save on paper and ink costs.

The biggest change Iowa State will face with the new addresses is in residence halls.

Lisa Ludovico, assistant director of the Department of Residence, said the project will be beneficial for residents by way of shipping through UPS and Fedex, but will be hard to implement by the start of the spring semester.

Ludovico said students are currently following a four- or three-line address program now and will be converting to solely a four-line program. The lines will be: name, hall/floor/room, street address and city/state/ZIP code.

This program will benefit delivery service and food delivery because most postal services or delivery service require a street address.

“During this semester alone a mother in Miami called because she was trying to send a package to her son, and UPS would not send the package without a street address,” Ludovico said. “The project will probably take a full year to implement in order to get the university used to the changes.”

Ludovico said students will receive notification of the address changes in their emails and mailboxes when they return for the spring semester. The information will also be posted on posters throughout buildings, and stickers with the new address will be placed on the emergency phones of each residence hall. 

Ludovico said the Department of Residence will probably renumber the residence halls to accommodate or follow the city of Ames format. This program would start in the fall to make implementation easier.