The transformation of Grand Rapids into a destination for life sciences research and top-notch medical care has caught the eye of economic development leaders around the state. Medical leaders stress that life sciences industry jobs round out the employment opportunities presented by manufacturing and design.
According to excerpts from the story:
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.
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