Advancing a New Wave of Urban Competitiveness: The Role of Mayors in the Rise of Innovation Districts

In some cities, at the advanced research-led end of the economy, innovation districts are developing around anchors such as universities, medical centers, or large firms. In other cities, creative hubs and cultural clusters are spurring remarkable artistic collaborations and making the arts an anchor for community development. This handbook offers a guide for how American cities can become stronger and more competitive by identifying and leveraging these hubs, with a specific focus on innovation districts, defined as geographic areas where leading-edge anchor institutions and companies cluster and connect with start-ups, business incubators, and accelerators. Districts are also physically compact, transit-accessible, and offer mixed-use housing, office, and retail. U.S. mayors have an instrumental role to play in the growth and evolution of innovation districts—a role that will likely evolve over time. Mayors can serve as conveners, providing a venue and platform for the development of a collective vision on the 21st-century imperative: collaborate to compete. Drawing on their skills as leaders, mayors can be champions by offering a vision for growing a successful innovation economy. Drawing on their regulatory powers, mayors can be catalysts by devising new tools or streamlining old rules to incentivize district growth. This handbook offers city leaders a way forward. Contents include: Overview on innovation districts; Principles guiding innovation districts; An audit of city assets; Mayors as conveners; Mayors as champions; and Mayors as catalysts.

• Record URL:
  https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/cs_20170622_uscm_handbook.pdf
• 
• Summary URL:
  https://www.brookings.edu/research/advancing-a-new-wave-of-urban-competitiveness/
• Corporate Authors:

  Brookings Institution

  1775 Massachusetts Avenue, NW
  Washington, DC  United States  20036

  Project for Public Spaces

  New York, NY  United States 
• Authors:
  • Wagner, Julie
  • Davies, Steve
  • Sorring, Nate
  • Vey, Jennifer
• Publication Date: 2017-6

Language

• English

Media Info

• Media Type: Digital/other
• Features: Appendices; Figures; Photos; References;
• Pagination: 78p

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Business districts; Cities; City government; Competition; Cooperation; Handbooks; Land use planning; Leadership; Urban development
• Uncontrolled Terms: Mayors
• Geographic Terms: United States
• Subject Areas: Planning and Forecasting; Transportation (General);

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01641073
• Record Type: Publication
• Files: TRIS
• Created Date: Jul 17 2017 9:32AM