Improving interaction through a pedestrian network

Was published in Jakarta Post on Sunday September 9, 2007

I always thought Grogol, West Jakarta, was not the best place for an educational establishment. Its noisy intersections, lack of tree shading and polluted air hardly constitute an ideal learning environment.

However, the inception of Tarumanegara University's campus building has changed my perception.

The design of the new building was selected through an open design competition carried out in 2005, and was won by a Bandung-based architecture design office, Urbane.

The most distinctive feature in their winning proposal was the strategy for opening up the campus building for much more socially friendly purposes.

Personally, I think this new addition to the campus is one of the most publicly engaging buildings in Jakarta. It has created a more intimate relationship with urban public life.

Both parts of the new complex, a 22-story campus building and an eight-level multistory car park, reserve the ground floor area for a pedestrian network connection and retail functions for the students.

Almost all urban private campuses in Jakarta faces the same problem of managing parking spaces for their students. With most middle-class households in Jakarta owning cars or motorcycles for every member of the family, educational institutions inevitably face parking problems as complex as those of shopping malls.

Usually, this problem is at the bottom of their list in improving educational facilities.

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I must commend Tarumanegara University and the architect for tackling the problem, which I believe demands great motivation, although the provided parking spaces seem inadequate in comparison with the university's large student body.

This strategy transformed the congested old campus where you used to struggle with the cars in the campus into a more lively venue where students can interact and socialize with each other.

It seemed like a small gesture, but the impact seemed larger than the campus itself.

According to its architect, Ridwan Kamil, the separation between new and existing buildings allows the wind to flow through the campus walk.

I must agree with him; the main plaza is surprisingly cool for Grogol. This unique situation provides a good basis for the school's other new feature.

The erection of the new buildings has also been accompanied by the construction of what has been called "campus walk", a large pedestrian strip plaza connecting all the campus buildings, from the Jl. Letjen S. Parman side all the way to the far end of the campus.

The walk has become the main gathering space for students to interact.

The space plays an important role in the knowledge exchange between students in an urban environment. Schools often consist of several high-rise buildings. A multi-high-rise campus dramatically segregates students from one another.

Consequently, the school needs to make an extra effort to provide an environment conducive to collaboration between students.

Urban campuses in North America such as MIT, USC, Harvard and the University of Toronto face a similar problem in how to bring their students together.

Among them, MIT seems to have put in the greatest effort. The school specifically built a huge gymnasium for its students and also promoted collaboration between departments by providing more specific joint facilities, while other schools merely organized social activities.

However, it is still up to the students how they exploit the collaborative environment that has been provided. The social culture in Jakarta is highly complex and segregated.

Students from different social classes and cultures come together at Tarumanegara University. Therefore, the university has a huge task to actively overcome this segregation in by improving interaction between students.

Schools with socially interactive students will be more productive; the development of our education system depends on them.

Tarumanegara University should continue with initiatives like the campus walk while other opportunities for student interaction and collaboration need to be explored.

All images are by Zenin Adrian