Reimagining Cities-Disrupting the Urban Doom Loop

THE GREAT THINKERS: URBAN UNIVERSITIES

Urban Universities have led the post-pandemic recovery in multiple key metrics, including a more than complete recovery in visitor foot traffic, the only WalkUP type to achieve this.

These WalkUPs represent 4.4% of the city’s GDP , while occupying just 2.1% of its total real estate inventory.

Urban University WalkUPs have recorded an influx of residents, beyond students returning to campus. In 2023, resident foot traffic in Urban University WalkUPs was 80.5% larger than in 2019. Over this time, resident employee foot traffic was up 44%, while non-employee residents (mostly students) surged by 94%. These gains have positive ripple effects on nearby real estate in surrounding areas. In the 20th century, urban universities focused on educating, housing and entertaining their students (Work/Live/Play). Today, their research and commercial spinoffs, often through the establishment of Innovation Districts, are incubators for new economic growth . A prime example is the Kendall Square Innovation District near the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Thirty years ago, this 1.4-square-mile WalkUP was an obsolete industrial area; today it houses over 2,000 companies employing 50,000 people who work in information technology and biotechnology. Most of the research that led to the founding of these companies originated at Harvard and MIT.

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