Students from the College of Architecture will host this year’s PARK(ing) Day, a global initiative in which artists transform parking stalls into inhabitable spaces, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Sept. 21 along P Street in downtown Lincoln. The interactive exhibits will be free and open for public viewing.

The installations, which will occupy 16 parking stalls between 11th and 14th streets, are team-based collaborations completed over the span of five weeks as a part of the students’ curriculum. The project provides students with real-world experience designing, prototyping and fabricating creative works.

PARK(ing) Day began in 2005 when Rebar, a San Francisco art and design studio, converted a single metered parking stall into a temporary public park. Locally, this event is led by Peter Olshavsky, associate professor of architecture, and sponsored by the American Institute of Architects Lincoln Chapter.

“While we hope that taking part in this global event promotes a better urban environment in Lincoln that is not so car oriented,” Olshavsky says, “we also want to show the role design can and should play in this city. Without good design, all of Lincoln suffers.”