The Brookings Institution launched a new guide to help local leaders assess their innovation districts.
“Assessing your innovation district: A how-to guide,” provides a framework to audit the assets that comprise local innovation ecosystems. The document is designed to aid in targeting resources toward innovative and inclusive economic development based on an area’s unique strengths and challenges.
The framework is centered on a set of key questions:
1. Critical mass: Where are the region’s highest concentrations of innovation assets?
2. Innovation capacity: Is the district leveraging and aligning its distinctive advantages to grow and strengthen firms’ innovation capacity?
3. Diversity and inclusion: Does the district have an inclusive, diverse, and opportunity-rich environment?
4. Quality of place: Does the district have physical and social assets that attract a diversity of firms and people, increase interactions, and accelerate innovation outcomes?
5. Leadership: Does the district have the leadership necessary to succeed?
The guide provides sample methods and data that can be used to answer these questions. It also includes advice on the indicators that innovation district stakeholders can track to gauge their district’s success, along with suggestions for how additional measures could be used to further fuel district growth and development.
Related Stories
| Apr 5, 2012
LEED 2012 will include new requirements for data centers
The U.S. Green Building Council’s updated LEED 2012 standards will require two systems to be modeled for each project in order to show power utilization effectiveness.
| Mar 30, 2012
CSI webinar: Durable & energy efficient building envelope design, April 24
This seminar will review recent changes in North America energy codes, examples of building enclosure wall assemblies being considered for code compliance, potential moisture management and durability challenges, and design tools that could be used to assess and minimize potential problems.
| Mar 30, 2012
Improved construction that followed seismic codes helped avert loss of life in Mexico temblor
A magnitude-7.4 earthquake that shook Mexico from Mexico City to Acapulco damaged hundreds of homes and sent thousands fleeing from swaying office buildings, yet no one was killed, according to early reports.
| Mar 30, 2012
Chicago may allow people to live in retail spaces
The Chicago City Council’s Zoning Committee approved a zoning change that will allow up to 50% of work space in low-intensity business districts to be used for living space.
| Mar 30, 2012
LEED growing fast in the housing rental market
Last year, developers of 23,000 U.S. multifamily housing units applied for LEED certification.
| Mar 30, 2012
Forest Stewardship Council critical of proposed LEED 2012 changes
According to the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC), the third draft of LEED 2012, if approved as written, would represent a step backward from the current Certified Wood Credit.
| Mar 22, 2012
Symposium on water efficiency: How much more water can be saved?
The Third International Emerging Technology Symposium by IAPMO and the World Plumbing Council features a session on water efficiency.
| Mar 22, 2012
Broker doesn’t have to inform contractor that insurer went broke, California court rules
A California appellate court ruled that an insurance broker did not have a duty to inform a subcontractor that a project’s insurer had gone bankrupt.
