At Bells Mill Road and Germantown Avenue, the Sugarloaf site, which the college bought from the Albert M. Greenfield Foundation in 2006, is key to the expansion, officials said.
The goal of the college, established in 1924 by the Sisters of St. Joseph, is to increase the number of full-time undergraduates from the current 900 to 1,500 over the next few years, said Sister Carol Jean Vale, college president.
The college, with gray stone buildings with terra cotta roofs, also has about 600 evening undergraduate students and about 800 graduate students, she said.
Vale said the expansion plan was "critically important" to the college, which had been a women-only institution until going coed in 2003. Over the last few years, undergraduate enrollment has nearly doubled, Vale said.
"We have taken into account our vision for the future, and we have benchmarked against the schools with which we want to compete," Vale said.
She said the college had examined its plans "from every perspective and point of view and determined that we need to grow to 1,500 full-time undergraduate students."
Some neighbors, who say they may seek legal recourse if the current plan is approved, raised objections over increased auto traffic, environmental issues, and the view from surrounding roads.
The City Planning Commission approved the master plan on April 19.
The plan calls for a zoning change from residential to an institutional development district so the college will not have to seek approval for each new building on both campuses.
Councilwoman Donna Reed Miller, whose Eighth District covers the campus, has introduced an ordinance to designate the area an institutional development district. The measure is scheduled for a Council hearing on Tuesday and could be approved before Council adjourns later this month.
