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>> Hanin Khasru
I've kind of lived all over the place and what brought me to Charlotte was the school.
I came here for Grad School.
I visited a couple of other grad schools, um, that had design programs and Charlotte
had the best resources for the type of work that I was interested in.
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>> Allen Davis
The duration of the program is only a year.
Itís a very well thought out program, despite it being very short, everything is very intense
and thatís what I like ñ everythingís not really drawn out.
And another thing, youíre not just talking about the basics; you are investigating all
theÖ all the aspects of urban design.
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>> Ashley Powell
The first project that we worked on here was actually in South End and we spent a lot of
time just learning what it meant to really do an urban analysis of an area and talking
to people about what they would like to see in the area.
Weíre not a top-heavy, planning, sitting in a room with other people we think are brilliant
deciding for everyone else what should be the case.
Weíre out on the street talking to people and experiencing things as they experience
it and seeing how they want to live.
And I think that that was a really good foundation for us, so when we went to Boston, we did
a project in Bostonís South End and the same principles applied there.
And we just got back from China ñ completely different context ñ but itís still the same
principles, just exploded, because you have such density.
Planning at the human scale is whatís important, even when youíre dealing with the macro-development.
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>> Dylan McKnight
We all should probably agree that we want our ñ the places that we live and work - to
continue to evolve to something better.
Nobody, I think, if you asked around the world, would want their place to decline into something,
uh, not as good as it once was.
So to pull it all together into one effort in this, you know, force in academia here,
uh, is helping out with that.
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>> Hanin Khasru
I thought I would go into urban design to make me a better architect, to make me more
sensitive to community issues, but now that I see, um, what urban design encompasses I
know that it canít just be a side thing.
It has to be a more focused part of my career.
Iím not sure where itís going to take me; I really want to find a way to merge these
two different experiences.
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>> Maria Floren
Something else that led me to come to this program was the international study abroad
experience that it included.
And so we spent, uh, six weeks in China, um, traveling throughout from Beijing, Shanghai,
Hong Kong, and uh, Suzhou, and we collaborated with some students there on a project and
so, this is our final semester and weíve continued to um, develop that project.
And so, their urban design and architecture practices are different and some of them are
really different from what we are used to here in the U.S.
It was a great experience working with the Chinese students and being able to collaborate
with them and thatís something that will really help us in the job market later in
the future I think.
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>> Ashley Powell
The program here is really cool because, since weíre Uptown, weíre in the midst of everything.
So all the professionals that are actually in urban design and doing what weíre aspiring
to do are right at our back door and we get the opportunity to be involved with them a
lot.
Charlotte is ñ if you know where to look - the streets are always buzzing with activity
and being positioned here, especially in the Center City building and not on campus, you
really get a firsthand feel for what youíre trying to do.
So Iím in school and Iím learning, but itís almost like Iím practicing at the same time
already.
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>> Adam Martin
You look right out the window and you can see all these great examples of streets and
architecture and you can look on the other side of that and see Uptown.
You see skyscrapers and the light rail passing through, um, which is another great addition
to this building, is the light rail, um, itís a great asset for Charlotte.
It goes right by this building; the building was sited expertly.
As an urban campus, I mean, itís the epitome of urbanism.
>> Allen Davis
Whatís great aboutÖwhatís great about this building, actually, is that itís Uptown and
weíre, weíre located around a bunch of services andÖand food and things like that.
Um, you know whenever youíre in the studio and youíre working on a weekend night, itís
always nice to look out the window and see the life happening downtown: the lights, the
people out, you can hear the, you know, you can hear the bass from the cars and things
like that.
Itís really, uh, itís really nice to see that type of vitality.
For me, I live in South End and thatís actually where the program used to be located.
I love living there and I can actually take the light rail to school.
Whatís great about the light rail is that itís going to be extended to the University.
So for me, Iím a dual degree student, and you know, five years from now, if the light
rail was developed, I would be able to go back and forth between the main campus to
this campus on light rail.
So, um, thatís going to be a great feature.
Charlotteís got great bike facilities; Iím a cyclist so that Iím able to ride quite
easily to studio.
You know, Charlotteís a very safe city.
>> Hanin Khasru
So, I know with the Master of Urban Design Program, the School of Architecture has put
in a lot of, um, resources lately.
Every student has their own monitor on their desk.
We are allowed to just kind of spread out wherever we need to, we have a whole floor
for ourselves, so whatever room we need to go to is always vacant, itís always available.
We have this resource center that Iím in right now which is wonderful.
It has a lot of books.
We have plotters that are open all day here.
We even have a little kitchen area, we have great views of Uptown Charlotte, we have parking
thatís very close to the building.
We have 24-hour security, so even when you have to pull an all-night you donít feelÖalone,
I guess and Iím excited that this building is here and I wish I was here enough for five
years to see it happen.
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>> Dylan McKnight
We have lots of folks from architecture and landscape architecture backgrounds.
Thereís a smaller percentage of us, like myself, from non-design backgrounds.
I really, honestly, have to say that the diversity is amazing.
It mustíve been in the course of a couple of days, all of a sudden we were all hanging
out and all sitting at each othersí desks and since then, itís been nothing but establishing
solid friendships and leaning on each others' shoulders and staying up late at night and
meeting each othersí significant others, going to, you know, someoneís house for dinner,
or throwing, you know, casual backyard get-togethers and itís beenÖitís been amazing.
And we, we do all come from different backgrounds.
Different nationalities, you know, itís all over the place, and itís really rewarding
to experience that.
I feel like Iíve found some lifelong friends in the program.
>> Adam Martin
My peers here, um, again they all come from different backgrounds.
I think the way we fit in is that we get to see multiple perspectives about approaching
urban problem solving.
Each of them are extremely professional, the backgrounds are, you know, art, or of course
landscape architecture, we have architects, we have urban planners, we have interior designers,
we have people with NO design background, we have business backgrounds.
I mean, thereís extreme variety and they all bring this amazing clarity to projects
because as a designer weíre always approaching it from a conceptual level or a design level
or a planning level.
You know, they bring a kind of a level of understanding of reality that we sometimes
dip out of and we always, you know, at the end of a project, we always find ourselves
trying to get it back because we have to explain that to the client, or the professor in this
case.
Um, I think my colleagues, what they bring is a good solution to a urban design problem
and they also bring a level of reality that leads you along it.
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