Call for innovation corridor
Posted Jan 11, 2011 05:21:56 PM.
This article is more than 5 years old.
A local resident wants the world to see the Region of Waterloo as the “innovation corridor.”
John Shortreed, a professor emeritus in transportation engineering at the University of Waterloo, made a presentation to the Region’s Planning and Works Committee Tuesday morning, asking council to get staff to look into the idea of promoting a stretch of the Region as the Innovation Corridor.
This corridor would run 30 kilometres down King Street, 6 blocks wide, from Elmira, to Conestoga Mall in Waterloo, through downtown Kitchener, and then down Coronation Blvd. into downtown Galt in Cambridge.
It would include the universities, the tech park in Waterloo, as well as cultural and arts centres like Centre in the Square.
Shortreed says “Innovation Corridor” should be a brand name for the Region, the way “the West” was a brand name for American pioneers — and he claims the Region would open up for development like the old west did.
He says a brand name corridor would attract new jobs, new innovations — even retirees from as far away as Buffalo who would want to come and enjoy the “desirable lifestyle and amenities” the Corridor would bring.
Shortreed says a bus system up and down this corridor would be better than the LRT, as the buses could have more stops.
Shortreed says the corridor essentially already exists, it just needs to be branded and marketed — in fact groups like Canada’s Technology Triangle, Communitech, and the Chambers of Commerce could just refocus the international advertising they’re already doing.
Shortreed says it would take an investment of a couple hundred million dollars, but economics benefits could start showing a year after such a branding program began.
Regional staff will look into the feasibility of the idea and report back to Council.
