Lexington, KY - What began as a class project and summer session curriculum for students at Winburn Middle School has brought those students fully into Lexington's most contentious debate.
The idea for the project was simple:
have several groups of students research, plan and model their own vision for the future of the CentrePointe lot in downtown Lexington.
The result, however, involves a visit from Urban County Council members, a chance to present a design to the Council, and a face-to-face meeting with the developer of CentrePointe himself, Dudley Webb.
Michelle Davis, the Winburn Summer Academy Coordinator, said that the goal of the project was to promote the use of technology and higher-order thinking skills, as well as integrating math, science and other fundamental subjects into a larger project.
As the project was being planned, however, Davis had an idea.
"When we were talking about the assignment, I saw that one of the goals was to discuss the controversy and issues (surrounding Centrepointe),"
Davis recalled.
"I decided to contact (Councilwoman) Andrea James (who has a child at Winburn) to see if the council would be interested in this project, and she made arrangements for them to come out here."
Council members Andrea James, Tom Blues and Vice Mayor Jim Gray were all on hand Thursday morning as students revealed and discussed their designs.
The flow of questions and answers between the students and the Council members rarely ceased as the various features of the designs were discussed.
The students explained their research processes and how they tried to arrive at structures that were uniquely Lexingtonian, prompting Councilwoman James to agree that a large part of the debate over not just CentrePointe, but all planning and building in Lexington, centers on the question, "What is Lexington's brand?"
Vice Mayor Gray was taken with the idea that this project reflected the challenges that Lexington faces with CentrePointe.
He said the recurring theme for him was that the projects showed, "how the dreams and aspirations are deposited in the center of the city."
There were several other recurring themes to the designs.
All designs stressed entertainment as a central goal, with theaters, skating rinks and restaurants in plentiful numbers.
Every building was created to be as environmentally-conscious as possible, with students peppering Vice Mayor Gray with questions about how to build "green".
Another theme that echoed frequently among the students was that downtown is for "adults only,"
and that there is a lack of options for children and families who want to be a part of downtown. Many of the designs were consciously created with the hope that these could be places where adults and children come to bond as families in their enjoyment of the space.
This was a strong note of seriousness among so many flights of fancy, and it served as a reminder that there might be a legitimate voice missing in the larger debate over CentrePointe: that of children.
The students working on this project have become so invested in it that they have arguably thought as much about what would be best for the downtown block as most Lexington adults.
Their designs are not mere products of imagination, but are born instead out of a collaborative thought process and meticulous research.
When questioned on a yearly revenue projection for her design, one student began to explain how she called local entertainment venues similar to the ones in her building and extrapolated the revenue data from what she learned.
Other students calculated square footage and amenities of the hotel rooms in their designs and compared them to the rates of existing hotels in similar cities.
Once planned, students used graphic design programs such as Google's SketchUp or FloorPlanner.com to create computer models of their designs.
Others relied on tried-and-true methods of cardboard and glue, which Vice Mayor Gray admitted is still in vogue among some architects today.
Despite the hard work and serious thought put into the designs, plenty of room was left for creativity and fun.
One student, a bit reserved during her group presentation on their design, lit up as she began to describe the "Michael Jackson"
floor of her hotel design, where each room coalesced around a different album, and pressing the button for that floor in that elevator would cause various Michael Jackson hits to be pumped through the overhead speakers for the ride up.
The designs themselves are imaginative and cut across the full spectrum: a tubular set of structures connected with skywalks, a rectangular skyscraper, a Greek revival hotel complete with columns (because, as the students explained, this was the first style of architecture in downtown Lexington), a large, low entertainment complex and, finally, a memorial park dedicated to the soldiers of recent wars.
The students of the last group felt that many people enjoy the lot just as the greenspace it currently is, and that with current economic conditions, a large building would be impractical.
The memorial park would play host to concerts and city events and would earn revenue as a venue.
As a result of the involvement of Urban County Council members, the student groups will compete for the opportunity to present their design before the Council.
The Council, however, isn't the only concerned party that took notice of these students and their project.
After Davis and two students were guests of the Lexington Morning News with Jack Patty, she received word that Dudley Webb would like to meet with the students to discuss their ideas.
"I suggested they come down and maybe we could walk the site and then we could go up to the office and show them how a development is done; how deals are put together," said Webb. "I thought it would be educational for them and fun for us to have them come down to talk about it."