On Thursday, Sept. 4, Mason Dining announced that Southside and Pilot House would be re-opening on the weekends after student concerns came to their attention. These changes come after Mason Dining announced earlier this week that the two facilities would be closing on weekends due to lack of volume in the dining halls.

However, in a letter sent out to residential students today, Mason Dining says they “misjudged” the demand. According to Mark Kraner, Executive Director for Retail Operations, he and dining managers met with students at Student Government’s “What Do You Want Wednesday.” From there, the Food Service Advisory Committee met, debated and proposed changes to the schedules.

“We made a plan that got as close as possible to what the students wanted, including 24 hour Southside, and the old Pilot House and its menu back”, said Storm Paglia, the executive undersecretary for Dining Services in Student Government. “Going forward, students can anticipate more late night options and better food quality across the board.”

In addition to the new hours, Pilot House will be returning to it’s old “Ala Carte” style menu rather than the Anytime Dining system. Southside will also have an expanded menu to include Ike’s and Pilot House options. Mark Kraner says that excluding Pilot House from the Anytime Dining system does not give students less options because Southside will actually offer more.

“Dining heard the students and is making changes,” Kraner said. “We will put these in place and review later this semester to see if any changes or adjustments will be needed for spring.”

Ike’s will close at 2 p.m. on Friday to finish contractor work, but the dining hall will reopen on Monday at 7 a.m. for regular hours. Ike’s will be closed every Saturday for the remainder of the semester. These hours will be in place for the remainder of the semester.

“When we opened Ike’s, we knew that the contractors weren’t quite done,” Kraner said. “We didn’t realize to the extent that they weren’t quite done.”

Pilot House will be closed this weekend so that dining staff can prepare for the change. Kraner says they still need to train staff and purchase more food. The facility will reopen on Tuesday, Sep. 9.