An affiliate of Purdue University has acquired the former American College of Sports Medicine property along the Downtown Canal Walk.

Purdue Research Foundation bought the 29,500-square-foot  building at 401 W. Michigan St. in mid-December for $6.5 million. It  plans to hold the 1.63-acre site for future development opportunities  tied to the emerging Purdue University in Indianapolis extension, a university official told IBJ on Monday.

“In an effort to enhance Purdue’s presence in the capital  city, we are working to increase the footprint of our Indianapolis  expansion for our students, faculty, staff and neighbors to utilize,”  Evan Hawkins, senior director for administrative operations in  Indianapolis, said in a written response to IBJ’s questions on the  acquisition.

“Purdue is focused on immersing ourselves and marbling  into the community, and we are having active discussions with Indiana  Avenue neighborhood leaders and our many partners in Indianapolis to  continue to inform those development plans to support Purdue’s growth  throughout the city,” Hawkins said.

Purdue officials declined to share additional details about short- and long-term uses for the property.

In 2021, Schahet Hotels LLC said it planned to replace the ACSM building with an 11-story mixed-use development consisting of office space, a  parking garage and an Element-flagged hotel. That project, which was  later abandoned, would have continued to be occupied in part by the  American College of Sports Medicine.

The college is considered an authority in the fields of  sports medicine and exercise science, with 50,000 members and certified  professionals worldwide. It now has temporary offices at 6510 Telecom  Drive in Indianapolis after the board voted in 2023 to sell the property  and staff formally moved out in 2024.

Purdue’s purchase of the site is one of several moves the university has made downtown stemming from the dissolution of IUPUI last summer.

IUPUI—otherwise known as Indiana University-Purdue University at Indianapolis—broke into Indiana University Indianapolis, a standalone campus in the IU system, and Purdue University in Indianapolis, which is considered an extension of Purdue’s main campus in West Lafayette.

Purdue’s board of trustees in June approved plans for the first building on the school’s campus, a $187 million project at the northwest corner  of Michigan and West streets that will include housing for up to 500  students as well as classrooms, lab space, a dining hall and  street-level retail offerings.

Purdue secured a partnership with Dallara in May to house its motorsports engineering program at the company’s U.S. headquarters in downtown Speedway, along with a deal with Elanco for a new building at the former General Motors Stamping Plant site on the west bank of the White River. The school also has an agreement with High Alpha for the executive education program within the Mitchell E. Daniels Jr. School of Business.

As IBJ reported in August, representatives for the city of  Indianapolis have asked Purdue to consider establishing a presence on  Monument Circle, specifically encouraging the school to bring programs  to either the former the former Anthem Inc. headquarters on the  northwest portion of the Circle or the Emmis Corp. headquarters in the southwest quadrant, both of which are now for sale.

Each of the two buildings on the Circle are privately  owned but have been difficult to find solutions for—in particular the  nearly 214,000-square-foot Anthem building, which has been vacant since  2017. The building is owned by Boston-based Franklin Street Properties,  which bought it in 2010 for $42 million. It was listed in October with an undisclosed asking price.

The 26-year-old Emmis building was put on the market by the company for $35 million in 2023 after Emmis sold most of its radio station holdings to Urban One.