During the 2010-2011 school year, the UW School of Planning launched the “i3 Challenge: Innovate, Integrate, Imagine”. It was a student competition to revamp the South Campus entrance. The winning team included 2 civil engineering students from the 2013 class: Amer Abu-Khajil and Jacqueline Doucet. About a year later, we are seeing the results of their design showing up- and it’s looking good!
The winning team, called INOVE, included classmates Jacqueline and Amer, and two Planning students that Amer knew through residence donning. After a few chats, the team clicked and they got down to work. Their vision evolved throughout the competition stages and they worked through many great ideas including bike lanes and scrambled crossings, constantly seeking the best possible design to meet the set criteria. The proposal they had to prepare was quite detailed in the final stage. It had to include a budget, 3D images, a function diagram, explanations, a timeline, and more.
To support the i3 Challenge, the university allocated money to run the competition and $100,000 to implement the winning design. Once the winning design was chosen, competition founder Dr. Jeff Casello from Planning and a professional team took over to get it going. The students were consulted to make sure their original design was respected as they tweaked it and worked out every detail. Originally, the project was supposed to be completely ready before classes this fall, but, like most projects, it was subject to delays. Two months later, the project’s components have been installed without a hitch, which is not a bad timeline in the construction world.
The two main design components, which can now be seen at the South Campus entrance, are a sleek black “Waterloo” sign and square arches. The arches were to contain quotes and milestones relating to the university, but time constraints caused that element to be deferred to the future. The block letter sign is meant to stand out from the road and the sidewalk to clearly label the campus. Another aspect of the design was a concrete walkway that was scrapped due to maintenance and budget concerns.
Full details of their proposal are available online at innovate.uwateroo.ca.
There will still be a few tweaks to the landscaping in the area, but most of the project is now done. The team hopes that in the future, efforts will be made to get those quotes onto the arches and to install more seating in the area, perhaps around the block sign.
Although the INOVE members may not go into professional planning after this, the experience working with diverse teams of professionals on a real-life project will certainly help them in any engineering career they pursue after graduating. Their design shows great pride in Waterloo, but the university has also shown great pride in its students by facilitating the i3 Challenge. Now, you will be reminded of that every time you walk through the transformed South Campus gateway.
Leave a Reply