ONE of the region's universities is expecting to complete a £32m development this year.

Durham University is building at Howlands Farm, off South Road, in the city.

The site includes the new home for the university's previously disparate post-graduate society, which was officially inaugurated as a college in 2003.

It was named Ustinov College after the late university chancellor, Sir Peter, who visited in March 2004, at the age of 82. The Privy Council approved the name change in October, and the following month, Sir Peter's successor, acclaimed US travel writer Bill Bryson, opened Fisher House.

It includes the college's social and administrative centre, including the post-graduate common room.

Considered the largest post-graduate body in the country, Ustinov College has a diverse international community, with more than 2,000 members from 100 nationalities, studying 58 disciplines.

The site has 395 single units but the completion of two accommodation blocks will take capacity to more than 500.

Its opening will coincide with that of a college named after Victorian social reformer and female educational pioneer Josephine Butler, which will provide a home to 400 undergraduates.

They will be housed in study bedrooms.

It will be self-catering, providing an alternative to the traditional full-board model seen in many of Durham's existing colleges.

Adrian Simpson, a senior lecturer at Warwick University, was appointed first principal of the Josephine Butler College, and takes up his post next month.

He said: "It's a new and exciting venture for Durham University and for all of us, staff and students, who will generate the ethos of the college in its first years."