BY KATHERINE YUNG • FREE PRESS BUSINESS WRITER • January 4, 2009
GRAND RAPIDS -- In a state grasping for answers about its future, Michigan's second-largest city may provide some important clues. Along a hilly stretch of downtown Grand Rapids dubbed the Medical Mile, a new economic engine is gradually taking shape.
The noise of moving backhoes and cranes lifting giant steel beams fills the air as construction workers scramble to finish a 14-story children's hospital and expand a biomedical research institute.
Further up the hill sits a $92-million, six-story outpatient cancer center that opened in June. It offers good views of the $90-million Grand Rapids campus for Michigan State University's College of Human Medicine being built at the bottom of the hill.
This and other construction activity, which altogether represents an investment of more than $1 billion, is part of a bold bet made by the city's business and economic development leaders more than a decade ago.
Like dozens of other communities around the nation, Grand Rapids leaders dreamed of transforming their city into a regional health care destination and a hub for life-sciences companies. Unlike many other places, however, Grand Rapids is actually trying to do it.
The initiative isn't without risk, and the results won't be known for some time. But how the city fares in this effort could provide important lessons for other areas in the state such as Oakland County and Ann Arbor that are also seeking to build a bigger presence in health care and the life sciences. More here.
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