Texas A&M University plans to build a nine-story Clinic and Education building near Baylor University Medical Center to add to its dentistry program. 

The 157,756-square-foot building between Gaston Avenue and Nussbaumer Street will serve as a clinical facility for Texas A&M dentistry students, featuring nearly 300 dental chair stations for local patients.  The new center will use advanced technology and offer specialized clinics, clinical support areas, classrooms and study spaces. 

The facility also will allow for a 25 percent increase in school enrollment.  The school said 90 percent of its College of Dentistry graduates stay in Texas to practice. 

Construction of the $127 million facility is scheduled for completion in fall 2019.  About $72 million of the facility's estimated cost came from approval for bond authority that the Health Science Center received from the Legislature during the 2015 session. 

The dental school is based in Dallas, with its main building at 3302 Gaston Ave.  The new clinical facility will be within walking distance of the school's current location. 

School officials, including Charles Schwartz, Texas A&M University System Board of Regents chairman, and College of Dentistry Dean Lawrence Wolinsky will dedicate the building site at 11 a.m. Monday. 

"As one of only three dental schools in the state, the Texas A&M College of Dentistry has an important role in educating dentists to serve the needs of Texans in the future, researching better treatments and providing excellent dental care today, which align perfectly with our mission to meet the needs of our communities," Chancellor John Sharp said in a statement. " This new facility will enable Texas A&M to continue providing cutting-edge dental care, and promises to be one of the many points of pride for the system." 

The site generated some controversy when the school used eminent domain to obtain some of the land, elbowing out the Elbow Room bar. 

The school said it already owned most of the land and used eminent domain to acquire a portion of the land where the new clinic building will sit.  It said it only took the step after its "good faith effort" to come to terms with the owner failed. 

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