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LightRail Toward 2020
Australia
This design competition was co-ordinated by lab.3000 and brought together Product Design Universities in the State of Victoria to produce the next tram design for Melbourne’s city center. The winning design was Yokopano (Chris Chan, Casey Phua and Yu-Chen Pan) from Monash University and the final design is under development for next government tender.
The semester long design project, which ran in 2006, aimed to bring together Industrial Design programmes across Victoria and promote product design to the broader community.
Lab.3000’s Tertiary Network manager, Stephen Langdon, brokered the project with assistance from an event co-ordinator. Stephen is an academic with over 10 years experience working with product designers in research and studio projects.
The LightRail competition was one of a number of programmes to build, connect and exhibit the best examples of student design projects and the final exhibition formed part of the larger State of Design program co-ordinated by lab.3000.
Funding came from the competition sponsors, Alstom Pty Ltd - a major manufacturer of transport infrastructure and trams based in Paris which has offices in Melbourne. The company also provided the winning team of three students with a six month stay in Paris during which time they refined their design with the Paris team. Student and University finalists received cash prizes.
Lab.3000 wrote the design brief and managed the judging and co-ordination of the final exhibition in which over 90 student works were exhibited, all of which demonstrated a very high level of competency and professionalism. With students from the various universities working on a single brief, it was possible to display the different methodologies and presentation techniques of both courses and students.
Key factors in the success of the project were the collaboration between university lecturers and program co-ordinators; a launch event that briefed the students on the technical aspects of the competition; regular progress updates between lab.3000, students and designers; strong media coverage; and the prominent location chosen for the final exhibition – the State Library of Victoria Gallery which is in the city centre.
The only barrier reported was that the PR Partners assigned from the sponsorship group were not briefed correctly and did not have a clear understanding of lab.3000’s role.
The project was formally assessed via quarterly reports and a final promotional report.
Above: The winning design
For more information go to: http://lightrail.lab.3000.com.au/index.jsp
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© Design Wales 2007
