PCRD

The Geography of Buzz

Posted by Christine Nolan

Richard Florida’s theories about the importance of the “creative class” are getting some further exploration from a new study by planners and spatial analysts at Columbia University in New York city and the University of Southern California in LA.  The new study, called “The Geography of Buzz” mapped the density of a range of cultural events in Manhattan and LA for a period of one year using GIS technology, and came up with clusters of hot spots in fashion, art, film, theater, television and music.  The study is described by a recent article in the New York Times and you can read it here.

The article contains links to the downloadable study report *get it directly here), as well as maps of the centers of creative activity in each city.  It’s worth taking the time to have a quick look at some of the reader comments, too.

 

Regional Industry Clusters and Rural America

Hot off the presses is our new report called, Unlocking Rural Competitiveness: The Role of Regional Clusters. This was a collaboration of PCRD and the Indiana Business Research Center (IBRC) at Indiana University and funded by the U. S. Economic Development Administration (EDA). The result is a model that can be used by America's rural regions to help them understand how to maximize their regional economic advantages. A very extensive companion website is available (here) with lots of tools and data including some fascinating GIS maps that show the distribution of key industry clusters across the U.S. If you want to go straight to the full report (277 pages) go here. You can also get the press release here from Inside Indiana Business