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The
Illinois Institute of Technology’s (IIT) main campus is an archetype of the
urban university. It is bisected by the CTA Green Line and bordered on the north
and south by public housing complexes that are, today, being transformed into
mixed-income communities. Many of its buildings are historically and
architecturally significant, and the campus has long been an oasis of prosperity
in an otherwise bleak environment. In 1995, IIT initiated a main campus master
planning process to review Ludwig Mies van der Rohe’s original 1940 plan and
address the university’s critical growth issues and IIT’s role in the
revitalization of the State Street corridor. Architect and IIT Board of Trustees
member Dirk Lohan was called upon to lead the process his grandfather began. The
result is a bold statement that is at once innovative and traditional in its
approach, earning IIT the Metropolitan Planning Council’s 2003 Burnham Award for
Excellence in Planning for its Main Campus Master Plan.
“The selection committee was impressed with the way in which
the Master Plan touches on so many aspects of community development,” said Terry
Perucca, president of Bank of America in Illinois, and presenter of the Burnham
Award. “The IIT campus is gaining renown for its strong commitment to help
stimulate the revitalization of the surrounding community. The school even had
the foresight to organize a class to give students an opportunity to look at the
issues surrounding the preservation of an old church in the
neighborhood.”
IIT is clear that it has a relationship of mutual
interdependence with its neighbors. The Main Campus Plan has a broad,
forward-looking and comprehensive vision that will unify the physical campus and
better integrate it into the neighborhood. “The main purpose of the Master Plan
is to close the many gaps and reconnect the fabric of IIT’s facilities into a
vibrant, urban and attractive environment,” said Dirk Lohan.
Construction of the new McCormick
Tribune Campus Center, designed by noted Dutch architect Rem Koolhaas, is in its
final stages and set to open Sept. 30, 2003. The Center unifies the IIT campus
both literally and figuratively — turning no-man’s land under the CTA’s elevated
train tracks into the focus of student activity — linking campus residential and
academic areas. Helmut Jahn’s neighboring student residence hall, the new “State
Street Village,” is also nearing completion and will open July 22, 2003. With
the first phase of the plan nearly complete, IIT and Lohan Caprile Goettsch
architects are moving forward with a master plan update that
calls for additional new residence halls, new parking structures, a president’s
residence, hotel and new commercial activity on the south end of the
campus.
“Our Main Campus is not an island. We have never lost sight
that IIT is part of a larger neighborhood,” said IIT President Lew Collens. “One
of our challenges has been to ensure that the revitalization we bring to IIT has
an equally positive impact on the overall neighborhood. Our Master Plan proposes
new residential construction not just on campus but in the surrounding
community, creating a ‘campus-in-the-park’ setting. Improvements to major city traffic
arteries have made the entire area more pedestrian-friendly. Nearly 100 trees
and 20,000 ground covering plants were added in the last year
alone.”
IIT’s commitment to stay in
Bronzeville was a key factor in getting the City of Chicago to invest in a new
Police Department Headquarters at the southern edge of campus. In addition, IIT
has, for the first time in its more than 100-year history, initiated a process
to create a residential community for faculty and staff adjacent to its main
campus.
“We felt it
was a crucial component to develop more informal exchanges between students and
faculty, enlivening the campus environment and strengthening the link to the
surrounding community,” said Collens. “IIT is a partner in developing new
residential communities like the adjacent Michigan Place condominiums in 2000.
This year, we announced an employer-assisted housing program for our faculty and
staff to buy homes in the planned redevelopment of Stateway Gardens,” he added.
“It’s more than just coming to work here everyday. It’s about calling it home, too.”
“IIT’s Main Campus Master Plan is a real life example of
what can happen when urban institutions collaborate with and invest in a
neighborhood – in their neighborhood,” said Peter Skosey, MPC’s vice
president of external relations. “MPC is proud to honor IIT and Lohan Caprile
Goettsch with this year’s Burnham Award, which recognizes planning efforts –in
the private, civic, or government area – that raise both professional standards
and our spirits as residents of the region.”
Now in its 16th year, the Burnham Award for
Excellence in Planning is presented annually at the Metropolitan Planning
Council’s Annual Meeting Luncheon. This year’s award carries a $5,000 cash prize
underwritten by Bank of America. MPC’s luncheon, on June 23 at the Hilton
Chicago & Towers, will feature keynote remarks by U.S. Rep. J. Dennis
Hastert, speaker of the House, on the impact of federal legislation on critical
regional issues.
Founded in 1934, MPC is a nonprofit,
nonpartisan group of business and civic leaders committed to serving the public
interest through the promotion and implementation of sensible planning and
development policies necessary for a world-class Chicago region. MPC conducts
policy analysis, outreach and advocacy in partnership with public officials and
community leaders to improve equity of opportunity and quality of life
throughout metropolitan Chicago.
Founded in 1890, IIT is a Ph.D.-granting
technological university awarding degrees in the sciences, mathematics and
engineering, as well as architecture, psychology, design, business and law.
IIT's interprofessional, technology-focused curriculum prepares the university's
6,200 students for leadership roles in an increasingly complex and culturally
diverse global workplace. IIT’s Web site is
www.iit.edu.
One of the world’s leading financial services companies,
Bank of America is committed to making banking work for customer and clients
like it never has before. Through innovative technologies and the ingenuity of
its people, Bank of America provides individuals, small businesses and
commercial, corporate and institutional clients across the United States and
around the world new and better ways to manage their financial lives. The
company enables customers to do their banking and investing whenever, wherever
and however they choose through the nation’s largest financial services network,
including approximately 4,400 domestic offices and 13,000 ATMS, as well as 30
international offices serving clients in more than 150 countries, and an
Internet Web site that provides online banking access to 4 million active users,
more than any other bank.
Bank of America stock (ticker: BAC) is listed on the New
York, Pacific and London stock exchanges. The company’s Web site is
www.bankofamerica.com.