We
blogged last week about an innovation district coming to
Durham, North Carolina, to be affectionately called "Durham
ID".
Asheville, North Carolina, is poised to designate three innovation
districts of its own in the downtown area -- River Arts, South
Slope, Charlotte Street -- with the goals of increasing the
City's tax base while bringing quality-of-life improvements to
residents.
Innovation districts are becoming an urban rage. These land
use animals are defined by some, including the Brookings Institute, as
"geographic areas where leading-edge anchor institutions and
companies cluster and connect with start-ups, business incubators
and accelerators [to create] physically compact, transit-accessible
and technically wired [urban areas offering] mixed-use housing,
office and retail". Think of these as infill versions of
the 1980s office park. In fact, Brookings makes specific
reference to "the transformation of traditional exurban
science parks like Research Triangle Park in Raleigh-Durham",
which Brookings contends is "scrambling to keep pace with the
preference of their workers and firms for more urbanized, vibrant
environments."
Municipal "buy-in" is critical for the development of
such innovation districts, of course, where underutilized areas
(particularly older industrial areas) are being re-imagined and
remade. Also, this "urban movement" of the educated
workforce -- the "great inversion" -- is not
without its challenges. For example, Richard Florida reports in The Atlantic
Citylab that people (and, most notably, "high-income
people") are returning to downtowns to live and to work, hence
the allure of the innovation district, however those people are
bringing with them "their preferences for and abilities to
purchase larger home or condos and private cars." In
other words, the creative class is reurbanizing but holds tightly
to the habits developed by a suburban upbringing.
We are excited to see such public-private collaboration as is
evidenced by the rise in the innovation district. But, as
always, careful and open planning among landowner, neighbor and
government will be critical to success.
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