In the years to come, downtown Columbia will be transformed. Workers will be able to walk from their homes to their jobs at research labs or high-tech companies. They will be steps away from dining and entertainment. They can spend their down time at a waterfront park on the Congaree River.
It’s all part of the development project known as Innovista... Columbia’s answer to the emerging new economy.
Innovista is the product of a creative partnership between the City of Columbia and the University of South Carolina. The research district will be home to university research labs and private companies. It will stretch from USC’s central campus to the downtown Vista entertainment area. Officials expect it to attract the best and the brightest as part of the state’s move toward a knowledge-based economy.
The City has had a pivotal role in the development of Innovista, said Dr. Harris Pastides, USC’s vice president for research and health sciences.
“It would be impossible to overstate the role of the City and the region,” Pastides said. “The support from the mayor, city council and the business community has been second to none. There would be no Innovista if there were no major support from the City.”
The City has helped to provide infrastructure for the project, including two parking garages, said Columbia Mayor Bob Coble. The City also is assisting with zoning issues.
“Research campuses are viewed as one of the primary economic engines,” Coble said. “To have a research campus in the heart of an urban area is ideal.”
The highly paid and well-educated employees of knowledge-based companies seek urbane, cosmopolitan environments to work and live, Pastides said.
“Some companies think they have to go to San Francisco for that,” he said, adding that Innovista aims to offer those amenities in Columbia.
Innovista Executive Director John Parks, a former city councilmember from Ames, Iowa, also praised the City for setting the stage to allow Innovista to occur.
“The City has done much to improve that area over the years. They’ve preserved lots of uses and created character in (the Vista),” he said. “That required elected officials with vision and talented staff people to offer guidance.”
Innovista depends on the support of the City, but it also will benefit it, Pastides said.
Not only will other local cities in the area see economic development stemming from Innovista, but it also will benefit the state, he added.
“This is ultimately about job creation,” Pastides said. “Innovista is a feather in South Carolina’s cap. It’s a tool in its arsenal of opportunities.”
The activity in Innovista is likely to attract other growth, Parks explained.
“I like to think of it in terms of an engagement with technology companies, as opposed to just a real estate development,” Parks said. “We fully realize the benefit is not just to develop a 500-acre parcel. It’s to create growth that takes on clusters.”
Those clusters of research and high-tech jobs can raise the per capita income of the state, Coble added. “It’s good for every part of South Carolina,” he said.
With Innovista, Columbia is part of a sea change for urban areas, Parks said. “There probably is a new urbanism afoot in a lot of areas in the United States,” he said. “There’s a rebirthing of downtowns.”