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Nanotechnology and the Community
- 1. What is an Innovative City? An experiment in placing technology and innovation Rob Shields and Kevin E. Jones
- 3. The innovative city is not found in: The built environment Other cities Science and technology Business Entrepreneurship ALONE!!
- 4. Virtues
- 11. Planning for Innovation: How to find your future? Embedding innovation in: •diverse partnerships and adaptable networks; •local identities and place images (including the negative) •Collective ‘hopes’ for the future.
- 12. Thank you! City-Region Studies Centre Faculty of Extension University of Alberta Edmonton, Alberta CANADA E: crsc@ualberta.ca T: 780-492-9957
Editor's Notes
- ROB SHIELDS Ask the question “What is an innovative city?” To think about the ways innovation can be supported by communities and places - This topic is part of a wider research project investigating the relationships between nanotechnology and the community in Edmonton.
- ROB SHIELDS Narrative: Goes out searching for the future. Finds support and happiness at home. Metaphor for where we should look for prosperity.
- ROB SHIELDS Narrative Innovation as an ambiguous term. Often approached by policy in ways which are socially thin, or even naïve. We look for solutions in isolation from one another, and often in isolation from the community. The innovative city is not found in (cycle through photographs): science and technology, other cities, the built environment, or in economic activity, alone..
- ROB SHIELDS Embeddedness Bottom up Path dependency Institutional synchronicity Germination – in the long term Fight for it – trade, economic and cultural obstacles Collaborative – it can’t be carved up Informed by tacit knowledge
- I am going to speak about a recent series of city tours we hosted which explored the dynamics between place and innovation. - Brought together experts (science, architecture, planning, history) – with members of the community interested in the future of the city. - We intentionally sought to unite disparate conversations about technology, development and planning in the city, to open these conversations up and to invite the wider participation of the public. The aim of the tours was to invite our participants to actively explore the city, and the innovative city in particular. We approached this task in two closely related ways: i. How innovations can help our communities meet current challenges, and fulfill hopes for the future? ii. How communities can support innovation in the city?
- Describe the process: Site visits, expert conversations and research deliberations. In this sense, it is important to clarify that the tours are a public research exercise – that is they were designed to support learning and discovery through engagement and dialogue. Exhibition last weekend – Telus World of Science, part of it is out in the foyer and I encourage you to look, and it will be in the atrium of Enterprise Square until Christmas. Grateful for the comment – was about challenging how we view our place – and to thinking about the types of cities and communities which support our prosperity now and into the future.
- Next few slides very quickly, you can look closer at them our in the lobby. Urban infrastructure – both a significant challenge for the city, and areas where technologies and entrepreneurs could support innovation. City office of infrastructure, Quarters development, EL Smith Water Treatment facility
- We toured places where innovation happens in the city – Edmonton research park – buy also explored the importance of downtowns, Michael Phair, TEC Edmonton – Startup Edmonton
- And, we toured the types of communities which supported our prosperity in the past, and how we imagine them supporting us in the future. Shirley Lowe, NAIT, Blatchford development which Mark will speak about shortly.
- You will notice when you look more closely at the boards in the foyer that our participants were asked to take photos of what they understood as the past, present and future of the city, and to explain their choices (captioning) Final deliberation, participants mapped out their vision of the city. Talk about the image. They began a process of charting out a future for the community (optimism, a strong sense of desire, and a vision for what we can/should do). Future communities recognise heritage, but also being forward looking; that will support our future economies; sustain our cities and foster resilience to the challenges we face; Technologies that support these visions. They do not provide a cohesive road map to the innovative city. Yet, the value of it this process of engagement and deliberation is that it open up the future to contingency and the civic capacity to challenge the status quo.
- Concluding comments: How can we plan for innovation: Earlier Rob had cautioned about seeking socially ‘thin’ approaches to innovation policy. We can, however, make these investments more socially robust and meaningful by anchoring innovation within the virtues and hopes of our community. This implies actively: diverse partnerships and adaptable networks; (bringing together the various communities and projects involved in building our future city) local identities and place narratives (supporting these networks by grounding them in our identities and place narratives) Collective ‘hopes’ for the future - (and pursue innovations that are central to the collective hopes and capabilites of our community, which necessarily implies an active and engaged conversation with its citizens)