A five-student team from the University of Colorado will travel to Salt Lake City to compete for a $50,000 prize in a national urban design competition against three other schools on April 1.
The four finalists were selected from 81 submissions to the Urban Land Institute Gerald D. Hines Student Urban Design Competition, which is open to graduate students in real estate-related areas of study at universities throughout North America. The CU team has already won $10,000 in the competition for advancing to the final four.
CU-Boulder Leeds School of Business MBA students Blake Church, Tom Magloczki and Chip Radebaugh, and CU-Denver and Health Sciences Center students Blake Belanger and Nathan Abbott from the College of Architecture and Planning will compete against students from Harvard University, Columbia University and the University of Texas at Austin.
Each competing team had to produce development plans for one of two sites in the Salt Lake City area. The Magna site -- a 2,208-acre portion of Magna Township in Salt Lake County, and the Northwest Planning Area -- a 2,002-acre undeveloped site in the jurisdiction of Salt Lake City, were the sites used for the competition.
"We chose to revitalize the Magna site, which is essentially an economically depressed town on the outskirts of Salt Lake City," said Radebaugh. "After looking at the high rate of sprawl in the area, we felt that transforming the urban site would be a better fit for the community."
The heart of their plan calls for extending an existing light-rail line through the Magna site, thus connecting the area to the greater Salt Lake City region. The rail line also would be meant to act as a magnet for redevelopment of the area.
During the final part of the competition in Salt Lake City on April 1, each team will present its final plan to the competition judges during a public forum, which also will be attended by guests from the public and private sectors. The teams have been working through March to expand on their original plans and to provide more detail about how to accomplish their development goals.
"One great aspect of the competition is working together with students from the other CU schools," Radebaugh said. "On the business side we focus heavily on the finances, while the students in architecture and planning bring a whole different angle to the table. It really brings a real world flavor to the project."
The Urban Land Institute, headquartered in Washington, D.C., is a nonprofit education and research institute with a mission of providing responsible leadership in the use of land to enhance the total environment. Established in 1936, the institute has more than 25,000 members representing all aspects of land use and development disciplines.
For more information about the competition visit the Web site at .