A group of Judson University architecture students gave researched presentations to Ottawa's business and community leaders Monday on possible steps Ottawa might take with its downtown to prosper in the future.

The graduate students have been studying and photographing the many blocks of Ottawa's business center for the last several weeks and offered their analysis of what the city might do to capitalize on the community's strengths and negate its weaknesses.

"Ottawa's potential as seen from the fresh eyes of our top grad students can offer conceptual designs on how best the city can chart a successful course into the future," said Keelan Kaiser, Judson's architecture department chairman. The professor was pleased with his students' work.

The 10 students, all working on master's degrees at the Elgin college, presented detailed drawings and maps that examined varied aspects of Ottawa from historical development to innovative incentives that might be used to attract new business to the downtown area.

Mayor Robert Eschbach praised the students' work and was happy to see many of them agreed with the proposed future branding of the city as a gardening center.

"I appreciated their fresh ideas of botanical gardens planted throughout the city combined with thoughts on how to attract new commercial to keep our downtown strong," he said.

Many of the students spoke of water as "the most important and most abundant resource in Ottawa." They offered insights to better promote the natural confluence of the Illinois and Fox rivers with redesigned public docking facilities and more pedestrian walkways leading from the downtown area.

As part of the course, the students will create maps of the individual amenities for the city, examine both existing and future transportation possibilities and research the city's urban scale in relation to surrounding communities.

Kaiser said his students' maps featured the density of retail establishments, urban housing and public uses of park areas. The group will offer perspectives on how the city can best realize the dream of being a conservatory/botanical arts center.

Reed Wilson, Ottawa's economic development director, said Monday's presentations were just continuing steps in a process by the students to combine present reality with new ideas for future design. He welcomed any new ideas the students might have on the steps to create a better Ottawa for residents and visitors.

The students will consider the feedback from their recent research and return later in the year to present formal designs and plans, which city leaders could consider in future decisions.