Bhubaneswar: More than 150 architecture students participated in an interactive workshop on project for public spaces (PPS) which was held at KIIT School of Architecture and Planning, here Wednesday.
The workshop was a part of the sixth Urban Lecture Series which was jointly organised by Bhubaneswar Development Authority (BDA), Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation (BMC), Bhubaneswar Smart City Limited (BSCL) and Bhubaneswar Urban Knowledge Centre.
The participating students, from KIIT School of Architecture and Planning, Piloo Mody College of Architecture (PMCA) and Department of Architecture, College of Engineering and Technology, have been tasked to prepare lighter quicker and cheaper (LQC) projects and sustainable designs for 30 public places across the city to make the state capital more beautiful before the Odisha Men’s Hockey World Cup -18.
There would be cash prizes for the best entries from the submissions from the eligible students.
The PPS lecture-cum-workshop was attended by SS Ray, Director KIIT School of Architecture and Planning, Swadha Dev Singh, Additional Commissioner BDA, Bhabani Shankar Chayani, BDA Member Enforcement, and Dharitri Das, Principal PMCA.
Swadha Dev Singh in her speech urged the young designers to make something unique so that the visitors would remember that they had encountered such things only in Bhubaneswar.
Bhabani Shankar Chayani, while inspiring students to experiment with new ideas on urbanism, also advised them to respect people’s sentiment and understand “local ethos.”
It is pertinent to mention here that whenever a public space gets created or developed, residents and tourists take note of it. This fact greatly overlaps with the process and philosophy of making of public spaces. In fact, ‘place making’ as a concept is not just important for urban planners but also for city residents.
To frame in a better way, the phrase LQC transformation of public spaces is generally used to describe the simple, short-term, and low-cost solutions that are having remarkable impacts on shaping neighbourhoods and cities.
The topic of discussion ‘Bhubaneswar Projects for Public Spaces’ and the initiative of LQC has been particularly picked up in view of the upcoming Odisha Men’s Hockey World Cup -18. There are plans to create a series of projects for improving and sprucing some of the public spaces of the city before the mega event.
After the inaugural and technical sessions, the students were divided into 30 smaller groups, in which they worked on their ideas which would be submitted to the organisers by the first week of October.