Emerson College is creating a coronavirus quarantine dorm in the middle of downtown as that school and others look for more ways of housing students — especially those showing signs of the virus.
Emerson says that all arriving students will have to first go to Tufts Medical Center for a coronavirus test, and those who test positive will be encouraged to return home. But if they have no way of doing that, they’ll be offered space in the Paramount, a 260-bed residence hall at 555 Washington St. downtown that will be used exclusively for quarantine and isolation, according to a filing with the Boston Planning and Development Agency.
Quarantine housing is used when a person has potentially been exposed to an illness and needs to separate from other people in order to see if they develop symptoms. Isolation housing is used when someone has symptoms or is confirmed to have the virus.
To comply with social distancing guidelines, the filing says, Emerson also is partnering with the Boston Park Plaza Hotel to supplement the college’s classroom space and with the W Hotel to add to its housing inventory.
On campus, Emerson has converted triple-occupancy to double-occupancy rooms. The W Hotel is prepared to provide 216 beds on nine of its 11 floors exclusively for Emerson student use, the documents say.
Fisher College also may isolate students who test positive for the coronavirus and live farther than 250 miles from campus at a Boston hotel, the Renaissance Inn by Marriott in the Back Bay, if the college runs out of isolation beds on campus, according to its filing with the BPDA. Those students will have to isolate for 14 days, have no symptoms and have a negative COVID-19 test in order to leave isolation, the documents say.
Fisher also plans to open its residential hall in the fall at reduced capacity, with all rooms as single- and double-occupancy only, therefore reducing the regular occupancy from 300 to not more than 200 students, the filing says.
The college expects to lease 81 beds in 55 rooms at the Loews Hotel on Berkeley Street to increase the number of available dormitory beds, the the documents say.
“As a result, we are seeking an alternative single- and double-room occupancy housing arrangement in a single location for students who can no longer be housed in our residential hall,” the filing says. “Housing students in single- and double-occupancy rooms will reduce the risk of infection spread and, if necessary in the event of exposure, allow students to quarantine in their rooms or in quarantine/isolation rooms that the college has set aside … on campus.”
Boston University has set aside 348 beds on the Fenway campus for isolation housing and 430 studio or 1-bedroom units on the Charles River Campus for quarantine accommodations, 179 of which would be at 1047 Commonwealth Ave., the university’s filing said.
Suffolk University is partnering with several Boston hotels to house some of its students because it is making all of its dorm rooms single occupancy, reducing the number of students it can house from 1,560 to 768 to try to prevent the virus’s spread, its filing says.
The university is setting aside approximately 6% of university housing beds for isolation needs, further reducing the number of available bedrooms for students.
So it has proposed leasing 162 rooms at the DoubleTree by Hilton Hotel, 156 rooms at the Wyndham Hotel, 80 rooms at the Boxer Hotel and 75 rooms at the Hyatt Centric Faneuil Hall, according to its filing.
All of the schools’ plans need to be approved by the BPDA and the Inspectional Services Department.
The colleges did not return calls or emails seeking comment on Saturday.
