WASHINGTON (February 23, 2023) – Four teams have been selected as finalists in the 21st  annual ULI Gerald D. Hines Student Urban Design Competition, an event that challenges teams of graduate students to devise a comprehensive design and development plan for a real-world urban site.

This year’s competition asked teams of five students representing at least three different disciplines to create a vision for a mixed-income, mixed-use community in North Charleston, S.C. Key considerations included housing attainability, equity, connectivity, sustainability, and resilience.

The four finalists are:

• Knot Charleston by Harvard students Youngsoo Yang, Tomas Quaglia, Ben Parker, Emily Johansen, and Rachaya Wattanasirichaigoon. The Knot is a new vision for complete living in North Charleston tied together by food. Drawing on the highest aspirations of LEED, WELL, and the Living Community Challenge, this mixed-use project synthesizes these certifications with the city’s unique context to create a well-connected, affordable, and enriching place to live for generations. The Knot is a 3.6 million square-foot, $843 million development that proposes acquiring the site through a combination of fee-simple purchases of private parcels, while entering long-term ground leases with the City of North Charleston to acquire publicly owned parcels. The project will cost $687 million and utilizes a financing strategy whereby the value generated from market rate multifamily homes will cross-subsidize community-oriented uses across all phases.

• The Quilt by University of Virginia students Vishal Jayan, James Williams, Andre Rezaie, John Ward, and Chinar Ravindra Balsaraf. The Quilt is a 1.62 million square-foot, $850 million development that will be built in two phases over six years at a cost of $663.7 million. Based upon three pillars of community, ecology, and connectivity, The Quilt is a vibrant, mixed-use development that creates an activated waterfront. This edge is plugged into by a series of landscaped, pedestrian-friendly areas that act as a sponge protecting the North Charleston community from the escalating threat of inundation. The Quilt is accessible through multiple equitable and sustainable modes of mobility, such as improved public transit and biking. This new and exciting LEED-certified neighborhood celebrates and amplifies North Charleston’s diverse population and allows the greater Charleston community to access a historically sequestered riverfront.

• Port Unity by Harvard students Alex Cardelle, Katia Krotova, Christopher Oh, Miguel Lantigua Inoa, and Somin Lee. Port Unity is a $2.2 billion mixed-use development that offers a place to work, live, and create along the water while helping rectify historic inequities. It is a 2.2 million square-foot development that will focus on residential living with creative industrial and retail serving as stabilizers. The project will deliver 2,488 residential units (24% affordable) along a dynamic waterfront while creating a more equitable development strategy for the community. In partnership with the city, the project will deliver $90 million worth of green resilient infrastructure and streetscape improvements across all sites. The maritime industry’s demand for labor will be met by providing collaborative mentorship spaces that connect area youth to South Carolina’s HBCUs to foster industrial apprenticeships, mentorships, and other educational opportunities with university and business partners in the area. Connectivity is imagined through land and water, with a bike path to the new BRT line and a ferry service to Charleston. Channels cut into the site will allow water to gather after storms, and the site will serve as a refuge from powerful hurricanes.

• The Leveling Field by Berkeley students Yash Gogri, Srusti Shah, Sagarika Nambiar, Justin Thomas, and Mahek Chheda. ‘The Levelling Field’ initiative strives to mend a history of economic, educational, and environmental inequity and create a more inclusive future for the city of North Charleston. The city’s transformation from a former naval base into an industrial centre has only benefitted a few big actors, proving to be detrimental for its people and the environment. The 2.8million sf proposed development thus creates a framework of equity that addresses these historic barriers, by providing opportunities of learning and working for a resilient future. At the core of the proposal is the ‘Spine’, also called the ‘The Levelling Field’, flanked by 305,000 SF of educational spaces and vocational centres, 375,000 SF of flexible co-working space, in addition to housing (25% affordable), while restoring 20 acres of wetlands to maintain ecological health. This unique design allows ‘The Levelling Field’ initiative to address the urgent needs of the community while promoting long-term sustainability of the city.

“This year’s competition challenged students to address the most pressing development issues in North Charleston, which strongly resemble those facing cities across the country,” said ULI Hines Student Competition jury chair Geeti Silwal, principal at Perkins&Will in San Francisco. “We were thrilled to review numerous projects that sought to promote long-term financial stability, address the city’s high cost of housing, and design a more walkable community that can provide opportunity to North Charleston’s underserved population.”

“The jurors were especially impressed by the level of effort, rigor, and creativity exhibited by the four finalists. We look forward to seeing their refined proposals in the next round of competition,” Silwal said.

During the last phase of the competition, the finalists will have the opportunity to expand upon their original proposals. The four teams pitch their completed designs before the jury on April 6, which will declare a winner the same day. The winning team will receive a $50,000 prize and each of the remaining three finalist teams will receive $10,000.

Proposals from five teams received Honorable Mention recognition: The Stage from Cornell; aNChord from Texas A&M University; Spine from the University of Calgary; AgroGenesis from the University of Calgary; and RiverLine from Harvard.

Six other projects were deemed notable by the jury: FLOW from the University of Toronto; The Hi-Lo – from Carnegie Mellon University; NewCity Flux from Carnegie Mellon University; The Fleet from the University of Michigan; Charleston 360 from The University of Texas at Austin; and Cooper Commons from Toronto Metropolitan University, York University, and the University of Toronto.

The competition jury consists of renowned experts from diverse backgrounds in commercial real estate, land use, and design. In addition to Chair Geeti Silwal, members of the jury include Alex Fraser, managing director at RBC Development in Charleston, S.C.; Bina Bhattacharyya, partner at RAMSA in New York; Charlie Long, principal at Junction Properties LLC in Oakland, Calif.; Christina Blackwell, senior vice president and Houston commercial real estate manager at First Horizon Bank; Jeff Baxter, partner at Cityvolve LLC in North Charleston, S.C.; Karen Horstmann, New York; Miller Harper, project manager at East West Partners in Charleston, S.C.; Riki Nishimura, principal at Populous in San Francisco; Rod Roche, partner at G&M Realty Ventures LLC in Oakland, Calif.; Sofia Song, global cities lead at Gensler in New York; Steve Dudash, director, special projects at Navy Yard in North Charleston, S.C.; Terence Cooper, director of investments at Foxgate Capital in Houston; Todd Richardson, principal at Synchronicity in Charleston, S.C.; and Tom Leader, founding principal at TLS Landscape Architecture in Berkeley, Calif.

The ULI Hines Student Competition was created with a generous endowment from longtime ULI leader Gerald Hines, founder of the Hines real estate organization. The program is part of an ongoing ULI effort to raise interest among young people in creating better communities and improving urban development patterns. The competition encourages cooperation and teamwork — necessary talents in the planning, design, and development of sustainable communities — among future land-use professionals and allied professions. More information about the 2023 competition is available here.

ULI hosted a webinar to announce the finalists on February 21, 2023 at 12:45 PM ET, and a slide deck is available here. All submissions to the 2023 competition are available at uli.org/hines2023gallery.

The Urban Land Institute is a non-profit education and research institute supported by its members. Its mission is to shape the future of the built environment for transformative impact in communities worldwide. Established in 1936, the institute has more than 45,000 members worldwide representing all aspects of land use and development disciplines. For more information on ULI, please visit uli.org, or follow us on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and Instagram.