UNM President Says Improving Downtown Key to Innovate ABQ Success

As the master plan for Innovate ABQ takes shape, University of New Mexico president Bob Frank shared his thoughts on Thursday morning about what the center will look like and his vision for innovation in Albuquerque.
As the master plan for Innovate ABQ takes shape, University of New Mexico president Bob Frank shared his thoughts on Thursday morning about what the center will look like and his vision for innovation in Albuquerque.
At a UNM Economic Forum meeting, Frank outlined three primary components to his plan: Innovate ABQ, the Innovation Academy and shoring up STC.UNM’s portfolio companies. Each will expand the university’s footprint and its reach, he said.
“I wanted to create a research district that melds the university more than ever before to the community,” Frank said. “It’s not just researchers. It’s lawyers who want to be in that space. It’s investors. It’s students.”
But, he said, the Downtown area needs to develop along with the Innovate plan.
“Part of the problem we have with Downtown is it was designed mainly in the 1960s, and it’s car-friendly, not people-friendly,” Frank said. “BRT [Bus Rapid Transit] is important. We want to see the university move to the Downtown area, and we’ll see that happen. It’s only a mile, but it seems farther.”
“A warmer, friendlier, Downtown has a lot of bonuses for the university, anyway,” he added.
The design firm Perkins+Will is developing the master plan for the site and will have a preliminary outline of it in November. The final plan is due in January.
Frank showed images of the city’s neighborhoods from the university to Downtown, connected by public transportation.
The seven-acre Innovation ABQ site cost about $7.5 million, and Frank said the university isn’t planning on putting more money into Innovate.
“We’re going to partner with developers and see what happens,” he said.
But one thing is clear to Frank: Everyone needs to be included.
“We train scientists and artists, and we have to tie them together; that’s the heart of the Innovation Academy,” Frank said. “But when our faculty wants to develop a product, we need a place for that, and that’s STC.”
The Innnovate ABQ campus is the bullseye of the new Innovation District, Frank said, and the school will have to hire a manager soon to oversee the new research park that is being designed for it.
By: Dan Mayfield (Albuquerque Business First)
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