This project will absolutely be able to reach its goals, and by doing so directly impact WCU students, dining service management, and staff/visitors. The dining occupancy counters allow students to choose smarter and more accessible times to eat, creates consistent, predictable dining traffic patterns, and helps management allocate resources more efficiently.
Instead of walking in to face limited seating, out of stock items, and high traffic times, campus quality is boosted by accessible and easy to use data. Digital screens connected to simple and cheap entry and exit camera technology are such a quick fix that maximizes quality of dining experience for every party involved.
The project stretches itself beyond the current GrubHub wait times and order pickup system. It brings new data to the table that hasn’t been collected before. People feel more comfortable when they can know how much of the occupancy is currently filled before they even walk into the room. They can build a consistent meal schedule with predictive modeling showing high-traffic times. The boost adds to the wellbeing and health of students, staff, and visitors, and is the reason to go with this exact proposal of a campus capacity tracking system.