Nelson Hall has problems: loose doorknobs, clogged shower drains, lack of hot water and malfunctioning climate control units, for example.

The maintenance crew has been working around the clock to fix the problems at the new dorm. The building contractor, too, has been on site since the building opened.

Other complaints concern the size of the rooms. Some students believe some of the rooms are larger than others, and notice that they are differently shaped. They wonder if the rooms were so oddly placed in order to put as many rooms in the building as possible. The architect of Nelson Hall studied residence halls such as those in Oxford and Cambridge to get ideas on how to construct this unique building.

The apartments are designed with window placement to help catch crosswinds to improve ventilation and ensure fresh air. The windows are placed to catch natural light in the living areas.

Some of the sophomores living in Nelson Hall don’t like the fact that the apartment doors to the hallway close and lock by themselves.

They compare these doors to the open ones in J-Mac that create more of a social environment as students are free to go in and out of the rooms of all their friends.

The self locking doors are part of a tight security system at Nelson Hall. Anyone wishing to enter the building must have a DU ID card. They then must have a Nelson residence card to access any of the halls, and only their specific room card will access the doors to the main rooms and bedrooms.

Nelson Hall will soon have a card-access system in its elevators also. Some residents say this high security card swiping is a hassle, but others say they feel very safe in the dorm, and say it is worth the small inconvenience.

The advantages of Nelson Hall are the designated study areas on each floor, a parking garage beneath the building, and better food in the cafeteria. The building can house up to 431 people on five floors, sitting above two levels of parking garages with room for 220 cars. The hall also includes a central courtyard, a large dining hall, a lobby lounge area, a technology center, and multiple lounge spaces on each floor. For security, Nelson features card-access entry to the building and to suites, apartments and to individual bedrooms.

Students hang out in the many common areas on the floors. There have been suggestions for improvement though: storage areas for luggage and packing boxes, more room in the cafeteria, peepholes in the doors to the hallway, and a dollar changer for the laundry room.

Junior Dave Jacobson, in his words, summed up the look and feel of the building: “It looks like they didn’t quite finish the building,” he said.