The Department of Residence Life is planning for the addition of new residence halls as well as cable installation in dorm rooms.

Residence halls will be cable-ready this fall, said Jim Van Arsdel, director of Residence Life.

He said two teams of university staff members are working to push for cable installation this fall. Although Residence Life is still negotiating with Tucson Cable Company, it would cost about $800,000 to install, Van Arsdel said.

Currently, students in dorm rooms do not receive clear television reception. The tentative plan is to install cable hookups in each room, and every student would receive "off the air channels," non-cable channels such as NBC, CBS and FOX, but with reception as good as that of an antenna on a housetop in Tucson, Van Arsdel said.

Students could choose to receive and pay for cable individually in their rooms. They would pay the fees through the cable company in town. Van Arsdel said the fee is still under negotiation.

Residence Life hopes to include its own channel, which would show movies and be used to disseminate information about the university. The University of Arizona owns some channels that are used for educational purposes, and Van Arsdel said they would be accessible to all students through this plan.

Although still tentative, Van Arsdel said installation would be this summer.

Also in the works for the next several years is a plan that would eliminate some residence halls and replace them with new ones.

The Corleone Apartments, 1330 N. Park Ave., which are operated like a residence hall, lie outside the university's planning boundary. Because the building is not owned by the university, when the lease is up in the summer of 2000, Corleone will be gone, Van Arsdel said.

Also in the path of destruction are Babcock Inn and Sierra and Hopi halls.

"Hopi has an inefficient use of land, which has doomed it already. Sierra, which is located under the east side of the stadium, gets no sunlight. It's not very healthy," Van Arsdel said.

The university hopes to redevelop the northwest block of Campbell Avenue and Speedway Boulevard. If this plan is carried out, Babcock Inn, 1717 E. Speedway Blvd., which is also operated like a residence hall, would be gone as well.

Residence Life plans to replace the lost residence halls and hopes to add a few more.

"We're looking to build a couple residence halls on the west side of Highland across from La Paz," Van Arsdel said.

In addition to the new residence halls, Van Arsdel said Residence Life plans to add a couple of parking structures on campus, plus more open grass space for unprogrammed activity, such as frisbee and soccer.

Christopher City, 3401 N. Columbus Blvd., UA's family housing development, will be moved near campus.

"We would like to bring family housing on campus by the summer of 1999," Van Arsdel said. "We would like to move as soon as humanly possible."