The Knoxville City Council unanimously indicated its willingness to sell the Sutherland Village property to UT for construction of a new housing development in 1970. The property was part of the 60-acre Sutherland Avenue Airfield developed by Walter Self in 1927 and purchased by the City of Knoxville in 1929. President Boling indicated that either apartments or a mobile home park or both were possible. He further indicated that UT would purchase an additional 10.6-acre tract with small houses between the Sutherland Village and Golf Range sites.
The architectural firm for the project was Painter and Weeks. Bids for the complex were taken in summer 1970, with Tipton and Reynolds Construction Company submitting the low bid of $3,515,000. A grant from the US Department of Housing and Urban Development paid all interest costs on the project in excess of 3 percent.
The complex consisted of 13 three-story buildings, with a total of 420 apartments. One hundred four of the apartments were completed in June 1971 and the remainder in 1972. The lower-level apartments immediately encountered problems with water seepage through the walls and mold. Eventually, waterproofing the exterior and interior was the solution. There were 244 one-bedroom apartments, 138 two-bedroom apartments, and 38 three-bedroom apartments. Approximately 120 one-bedroom, 30 two-bedroom, and 10 three-bedroom apartments were furnished. Each apartment had electric heating and cooling, an electric range, a refrigerator, and wall-to-wall carpet. A service building housed the laundry room, recreation room, bus waiting area, maintenance shop, and the resident manager’s office. Additional recreational facilities included a swimming pool, wading pool, two playground areas, tennis courts, and a basketball court.
The university announced in February 2009 that both Sutherland and Golf Range apartment complexes would be taken out of service at the end of the 2010 spring semester because of declining demand for university-supplied housing for graduate and married students, the availability of private apartment complex options that obviated the need for university-owned- and-managed apartment complexes for graduate and married students, and an evaluation that concluded that renovation of the complexes was not possible—both would have had to be torn down and rebuilt. The complex was taken out of service in 2010 and provides part of the site for the student recreation and intramural fields.