Creative Thinking and Innovation

My final assignment in the MLPD program was a redevelopment plan of Providence Park, a 55 - acre property in College Station, Texas that was developed during the Reagan Administration. The primary office building of Providence Park is the "Old Westinghouse" building. The Old Westinghouse building has a total of 180,000 square feet of usable space, was 52% occupied, and it was zoned as both, MU2 and General Commercial. The Old Westinghouse building was built as a part of the Cold War effort, and it was built with the intention of manufacturing rocket chip technological. Northrop Grumman Corporation was one of the initial tenants of the building; however, the company decided, very early on, to discontinue their lease and consolidated their offices out-of-state. Providence Park is flanked by two churches, has a home owners’ association located directly behind it, and it includes an existing detention pond. Eleven of the 55 acres were designated for Academy Sports and Outdoor’s usage. With all else said, our team was forced to think creatively in our approach to propose a redevelopment of Providence Park. 

Given the time and commitment our proposal would demand of my teammates and I, we decided to make an honest effort in conceptualizing a practical redevelopment plan. As a part of our proposal, my teammates and I drafted an entity to "tie-up" the property, and we conducted an extensive market analysis. In our proposal, we planned to convert much of the unused office and warehouse space into class A office and retail space. We proposed converting the central area of the Old Westinghouse building into a central courtyard. This area could serve as an amenity while also providing an abundance of much needed natural light for the overall building. We drafted a preliminary feasibility report that was based on estimated costs and expenses obtained from the Construction Management Department, at Texas A&M. In the end, my teammates and I were recognized for having the best overall group presentation and proposal by the Assistant Dean of the College of Architecture and by one of the Vice Presidents of Oldham Goodwin Group LLC.