Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
city departments, to encourage the supply of low cost facilities. A policy based on
similar reasons was developed by Leipzig to counteract the effect of suburbaniza-
tion, inner city decay and low investment. In 2008 it was estimated that the city had
over 38,000 empty premises in the decaying inner city, even though many were of
rich architectural heritage. Few private owners were prepared to pay the costs of re-
development. However, a private housing association called HausHalten (HH) was
given tax breaks by the city and has brought many areas back to life by renovating
property. The association was keen to attract low income creative or cultural work-
ers and students who would help revitalise the area by their artistic skills. The new
premises were called Guardian Houses since the new occupants look after the prem-
ises. This replaced the options of either continuing decay, or the development of a
more typical urban renewal sequence of gentrification which would be residential-
only. This example shows the wider need to improve the cultural amenities in the
city in order to improve the liveability of the city, which may then attract creative
workers, although unlike the emphasis on this feature by Florida (
2002
) this is only
one of the features necessary for success in creating knowledge centres.
The third major category in the Physical Capital Domain is the availability of
adequate
venture capital
to support new innovative activities. Big companies may
have the resources to do so, but many inventions come from new entrepreneurs
whose access to capital is limited. Hence many cities and governments have cre-
ated new sources of money or agencies to help find this support. For example, in
the emerging Tech City cluster centred on Old Street station in London's East End,
a 'Million Pound Start-Up' competition was organised by Digital Shoreditch in
2013, while the government's 'Seed Enterprise Investment' programme reduces the
risk of inventors losing all of an investment in a start-up (TE
2013
). However a real
problem in many high-tech clusters is not the initial start-up or seed money but the
multi-millions needed for subsequent phases of development. Hence the govern-
ment persuaded the London Stock Exchange to list fast-growing firms if they float
10 % of their equity, instead of the normal 25 %. Access to enough
talented people
is
also a problem that needs to be solved as national immigration rules are often cum-
bersome to overcome or too restrictive. Hence there have been attempts in Britain
to make exceptions to the normal immigration rules, with engineers and executives
now being defined as 'exceptional talents', a rule that previously made it possible
to import artists and scientists.
The
Associational or Meta-Capital System
category summarizes the specific re-
lational opportunities designed to maximize the interactions within and between
the various input capital, human and incremental capital domains to create what
amounts to an eco-system of related activity. Given the importance of contacts in
the tacit knowledge dissemination for innovative activity, ways of developing exist-
ing networks or enhancing others are essential, in addition to providing physical
contact spaces. In most towns and cities organizations of businesses have always
existed, but these need to be strengthened and extended, especially in specialist
fields. In Munich a cluster of Audio-Visual Media (CAM) firms links together over
300 companies in this field. The Milan Network of Design (MInd) established by
the municipality, includes a design museum and the largest design schools. It spon-
