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Home > Business > Casinos Friday, May 30, 2008

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Students eager to show plans for Biloxi

Meeting set to get residents' input

By MARY PEREZ
meperez@sunherald.com

BILOXI --

Students from Mississippi State University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology will share their proposals for rebuilding the low-lying Back Bay and marsh areas in East Biloxi at a public meeting Tuesday.

Refreshments will be served and Vietnamese and Spanish interpreters will be available.

"It's going to be an open-house format," said Christine Gaspar, an MSU instructor and staff member at the Gulf Coast Community Design Studio. Four groups of students focused on different areas around Point Cadet, the end of Division Street and the areas that used to be bayou.

The students will pin up their work, said Gaspar, and ask for feedback from the community and casino developers.

"The students have worked hard to develop plans and images of what some of the more damaged, flood-prone areas in the neighborhood could look like," said Gaspar, "and they are eager to put them in front of community members to find out how they might improve upon their work."

Six MSU students studying architecture and city planning spent the spring semester living, working and studying in East Biloxi through the Gulf Coast Community Design Studio.

Twice during the semester they were joined by 12 graduate students from MIT, who concentrated on designs for the fourth linking road that will complete the circle around East Biloxi.

"They originally looked at Pine Street," where the city intends to connect the loop, said Gaspar. Then they looked at pushing the road out of the residential area and closer to the water, where casino development is likely to take place.

"They tried to be very practical," she said and explore the idea while taking into account the 800-foot rule for onshore casinos.

Another proposal looks at how higher-density residential development might connect to the existing neighborhoods of East Biloxi and how parks can be created.

For the five MSU students and one student from University of Minnesota, "it was definitely a good experience for them," Gaspar said, to be working with MIT graduate students. One of the MSU students is a Diamondhead native and since they were in Biloxi for the entire semester, the undergraduate students provided insights to the MIT graduate students about the area and the culture.

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