“U-Serve” is a one-day community based event organized by the University of Miami, School of Architecture and the School’s outreach arm, the Center for Urban and Community Design. The goal of U-Serve is to engage the community at large through architectural based interventions. On March 30, 2016, the entire school (roughly 300 students, and 50 faculty and staff) suspended classes for the day to engage with the public and contribute in avariety of ways, their particular skill-set,to the betterment of our shared community.The School focused on ways to bring awareness, interest, and support to the “Underline” project. The Underline is a proposed linear park located along the underside of the metrorail line. Scattered along the rail line, at various locations, faculty lead teams of students and implemented different ideas for how best to broadcast the importance of the project. Some teams designed and built “pop-up” urban spaces, while others will created temporary awareness installations. It was meant to be a day of fun, while delivering a serious message: Urban space matters in our community, and the University of Miami is dedicated to help improve it.
University Metrorail Station: Outdoor-Living Installation
Ponce de Leon Blvd, Coral Gables
Students and faculty built and installed temporary outdoor seating and exercise equipment, while surveying transit users.
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Life’s a (Transitory) Beach: Staged as a pop-up beach at the University Metrorail station, a temporary urban space using umbrellas / potted plants was installed. Adirondack chairs built by U-SoA students enhanced the space.
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Flash Mob: Performance art and unique student-elaborated signs @ University Station raised awareness for the underline project.
Coconut Grove Metrorail Station: Slow Ride
2780 SW 27th Ct, Miami, FL
U-SoA Professors Carie Penabad and Adib Cure, collaborated with UM College of Engineering, leading students to create an installation using fish netting, suspended between palm trees, creating “Slow Ride” in the plaza.
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The underside of the Coconut Grove Metrorail station was temporarily transformed by means of a multi-sensory installation. A field of one thousand, orange, coconut-scented, car, air-fresheners were placed on thin posts to create a micro-scaled artificial landscape. This public act de-contextualizes an ordinary everyday object associated with car culture and transforms it into an extraordinary urban experience, encouraging the passerby to consider the Slow-Ride associated with walking or biking through the city. The project was installed on March 30, 2016 as part of the University of Miami School of Architecture USERVE day to bring awareness to the Underline project, a new linear park and bike trail for the City of Miami.
Brickell Metrorail Station: Performance Art
1001 SW First Ave. Downtown Miami, FL
U-SoA faculty members, Christina Canton and Jorge Trelles, guided students to create a blow-up rendering of The Underline, and brought temporary dance and music demonstrations to the space.
