{"id":56193,"date":"2021-02-27T00:00:05","date_gmt":"2021-02-27T08:00:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/world.edu\/?p=56193"},"modified":"2021-02-26T12:34:53","modified_gmt":"2021-02-26T20:34:53","slug":"think-big-why-the-future-of-uni-campuses-lies-beyond-the-cbd","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/world.edu\/think-big-why-the-future-of-uni-campuses-lies-beyond-the-cbd\/","title":{"rendered":"Think big. Why the future of uni campuses lies beyond the CBD"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/p>\n

The \u201cdreaming spires\u201d of Oxford University that Matthew Arnold romanticised in 1865 still have a powerful grip on our image of the university. Nevertheless, the university town is part of the past. A key reason for this is the expense of developing facilities on a confined site, particularly in a heritage setting.<\/p>\n

The new\u00a0Cavendish Laboratory<\/a>\u00a0at Cambridge will cost \u00a3300 million for similar reasons.<\/p>\n

Expansive campuses dominate overseas<\/strong><\/h4>\n

In the 1970s, the\u00a0University of Heidelberg<\/a>\u00a0moved from its site in the town of Heidelberg to a new 112-hectare campus on the north bank of the Neckar River. This enabled the university to develop new space, particularly laboratory space, at economical cost. In the decade after 2007, Heidelberg rose from\u00a0between 51st and 75th<\/a>\u00a0in Science on the Academic Ranking of World Universities (ARWU) to 39th. Oxford slipped from tenth to 13th and Cambridge from fourth to seventh.<\/p>\n

Of the No. 1 universities in the 54 subjects tracked by the ARWU, including humanities subjects, 84% occupy large campuses of 50 hectares or more.<\/p>\n

\"\"

Aerial view of the University of Paris-Saclay campus under construction in 2015, when it began its first full academic year. Paris-Saclay<\/p><\/div>\n

The most interesting campus development in the world at the moment is the University of Paris-Saclay. The French government is grabbing the best bits of the University of Paris and assembling them into a super research university. Intended to rank within the ARWU top ten, it is already\u00a0first in mathematics and 14th overall<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Paris-Saclay is located on 189ha of farmland south of Paris, close to a railway station. It\u2019s the classic large-area campus. Next to the campus lots of cheap land has been made available for startup companies that will be spun out of the university or existing companies that relocate to use its research or facilities.<\/p>\n

\"\"

ARINA, Author provided<\/p><\/div>\n

\"\"It is another attempt to recreate Silicon Valley, and there\u2019s every reason to try. As part of research by ARINA, an architectural firm specialising in higher education, community and public design, a simple mapping project shows 67% of the market capitalisation of US Fortune 500 Tech companies is located in the triangle between San Francisco, Oakland and San Jose. Two top ten universities, Stanford and UC Berkeley, are also located there.<\/p>\n

Similarly, in the UK, a belt of high-tech and new-economy industries stretches from Bristol through Oxford, Milton Keynes, Bedford and Cambridge. Also located here are the ARWU top 100 universities of Bristol, Oxford and Cambridge and the nearly-there Warwick.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

\"\"More than 50% of the market capitalisation of companies in the FTSE Tech 100 are also located in this area. Only 17% of companies in this index are located in Greater London, and none in central London.<\/p>\n

\"\"UCL (formerly University College London) is building a new large-area campus at UCL East on the former London Olympics site in Hackney. Its aim is to ease pressure on the 9.7ha UCL campus in Bloomsbury and to provide opportunities for partners to be located close by.<\/p>\n

What about Australian developments?<\/strong><\/h4>\n

In Australia, our most recent efforts at building campuses are a mixed bunch.<\/p>\n

The new Western Sydney \u201cAerotropolis<\/a>\u201d and the new University of Melbourne\u00a0campus at Fishermans Bend<\/a>\u00a0in Melbourne are plausible because they are expansive campuses with land for partners to invest in nearby facilities. Delivering low and mid-rise buildings on less expensive land served by public transport seems like a good bet.<\/p>\n