The focus of the design project is the Wills Creek corridor in Cumberland, MD. This site spans approximately 2.3 miles along Wills Creek, from its confluence with the North Branch of the Potomac River in the south to its junction with Braddock Run in the north. Students are tasked with creating a mixed-use green corridor—a linear redevelopment district along the creek that incorporates new buildings through infill operations and adaptive reuse of existing structures for residential, retail, and hospitality purposes. 

Additionally, students are addressing the challenge of transforming Wills Creek, currently a flood control infrastructure, into a dual-purpose system.

The goal is to maintain its critical flood prevention function, especially given increased rainfall patterns, while also creating urban public open spaces to serve the new district and its surrounding communities. Students explored various strategies to preserve the creek’s functionality while reimagining its morphology and redesigning its banks and bed. These strategies reflect contemporary approaches to urban rivers, which are increasingly shifting "from hard, technical hydraulic engineering to semi-natural biological engineering for shaping watercourses as multifunctional places for all flora, fauna, and people along and in the water" (Dreiseitl, 2017).