• Pinellas Technical College set to show off $17M redesign of Clearwater campus

    TBNreopen

    JOHN GUERRA, Tampa Bay Newspapers

    CLEARWATER — When students return to Pinellas Technical College in October, they’ll find a reconfigured campus in Clearwater with new lighting, airy classrooms, and better tools and technology for learning their trade.

    That’s the result of a $17 million redesign that includes more bays for teaching automotive and diesel engine repair and new classrooms for learning cosmetology, nursing, heating and air conditioning, welding, electric, plumbing, and other trades, said John Kidwell, an architect with Hepner Architects of Tampa, the company that redesigned the college. The firm started with the details, then worked to larger changes, he said.

    “When you used to walk down the hallway in Building 7, for example, it all looked the same, but we employed different colors at corridor intersections to provide visual cues to provide wayfinding without signs,” Kidwell said. The firm also installed new LED lighting to replace fluorescent lighting in use on campus since the 1980s.

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