Exploring the emergence of innovation districts as volumetric urban projects in Taipei City

Recent studies have often overemphasized the planning of innovation districts (IDs) as an area-based territorial extension that supports localized innovation and entrepreneurship. However, this approach obviously neglects to explore the three-dimensional growth of the volumetric properties that are produced and extracted through spatial governance practices in an ID. This paper addresses that gap with a qualitative case study of Nangang District in Taipei City to investigate how spatial governance practices contribute to the institutionalization of volumetric growth in an ID. While place-based urban development has been strategically referred to as innovation-led economic development, this paper argues that the emergence and evolution of IDs are driven by three urban volumetric strategies for securing volumetric properties: engineering, anchoring, and financialization strategies. These strategies reveal that state-led spatial governance simultaneously pursues the political-economic objectives of achieving urban–industrial upgrading while also generating governance tensions and potential conflicts associated with the vertical expansion of the innovation district. Furthermore, this research suggests that a deeper understanding of the volumetric properties of innovation districts is essential for shaping urban planning and policymaking that are capable of fostering dynamic and resilient innovation economies.