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Innovate Holyoke
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Governor Deval Patrick and Housing and Economic Development Secretary Gregory Bialecki (left) |
This project, Governor Patrick emphasized, was not about trying to do something to, or for Holyoke. “It is of Holyoke,” he said. “This is about building our better tomorrows.”
Governor Patrick expressed his continued support and enthusiasm for the project, which could break ground in a newly-designated innovation district in the center of Holyoke within the next year.
“This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to reinvent a city,” said Tim Brennan, the Executive Director of the Pioneer Valley Planning Commission. “It’s a game-changer.” “Holyoke,” Brennan continued, “was the first planned industrial city in America 160 years ago. It is now coming full circle.”
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| Ten Minute Media CEO Brendan Ciecko |
One of the key messengers is Brendan Ciecko, a 21-year-old born and bred Holyoke entrepreneur who created InnovateHolyoke.com to be the project’s portal on the web. “I’ve always believed in the revitalization of this great city,” he said, adding, “This is not your typical government website.”
Ciecko is the founder and CEO of Ten Minute Media, a Holyoke-based new media, marketing, and web design company, which is a shining example of the innovation economy in the region. Ten Minute Media now boasts clients including some of the top names in the recording industry, such as Capitol, Atlantic, RCA, and Columbia featuring world-renowned artists like Mick Jagger, Katy Perry, and Van Morrison, among others.
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| Holyoke Mayor Michael Sullivan |
Holyoke’s Rebirth
What makes Holyoke an attractive site for the new high performance computer center is, in computer parlance, ping, power and pipe: a high-speed network, electrical power, and cooling infrastructure. Holyoke's location on the banks of the Connecticut River offers access to low-cost hydroelectric power, while the river and the city's many canals offer potential cooling resources. Existing fiber optic/network connections running along Interstate 91 readily allow access to major research universities around the state.
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UMass Amherst Graduate School Dean John Mullin (left) and Pioneer Valley Planning Commission Executive Director Tim Brennan (right) |
Since the signing of a letter of intent on June 11 at the Holyoke Public Library by the partners, the project has been the focus of an intense, 120-day planning effort, asking and answering key details about what the project would look like.
In that time, teams from the project partners developed an organizational model, a business structure for current and future partners, preliminary building designs, energy efficiency targets, a schedule for design and construction, a shared research agenda, and identified the operating budget and capital costs for developing the facility.
Some 80 different properties in Holyoke’s canal district reportedly have been reviewed as potential sites for the high performance computer center. Housing and Economic Development Secretary Gregory Bialecki indicated that working to execute a purchase and sales agreement is an important step for the project in the coming months.
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Boston University Vice President for Research Andrei Ruckenstein (left) and UMass President Jack Wilson (right) Universities' Agreement >> |
This hard work, which is often not as visible or as sexy, say, as a YouTube video of the demolition of an industrial smokestack, is absolutely critical to the success of the project, one economic development consultant noted.
A key member of the team, Andrei Ruckenstein, is the Vice President and Associate Provost for Research at Boston University. He has worked closely in designing the research protocols for the new center with Jim Kurose, the Interim Dean of the College of Natural Science and Mathematics at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, and Victor Zue, the Director of the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory.
“Collaboration is very hard work,” said Ruckenstein, who was attending the celebration as Boston University’s representative. He said he is excited about the project’s potential, citing the growing need for computing power in virtually all large science and engineering projects.
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Holyoke Gas & Electric Manager Jim Lavelle |
Kurose, in turn, called the new computing center “a great opportunity” in a recent interview. “It will allow us to investigate simulation on a massive scale, in marine sciences, in life sciences,” he said.
The local perspective
Many in the audience attending the event were committed to being active participants in the rebirth of Holyoke. City resident Daphne Board said of the new computing center that it will anchor the new “Innovation District” in downtown Holyoke and is a perfect fit for the city. A graduate of the Rhode Island School of Design, she and her husband chose to live in downtown Holyoke six years ago, because of its affordability, its architecture, and its potential. Together, the couple renovates properties as a business. “It’s a great place to live,” she said.
Equally optimistic about the new high performance computing center was Kathy McKean, whose roots in Holyoke go back some 40 years, and is involved with the restoration of the Victory Theater.
“It’s a new day for Holyoke,” said Deborah Boronski-Burack, the President of the Western Massachusetts Chamber of Business & Industry. She recalled the days of the St. Patrick’s Day parade in Holyoke, when she had, working on a float, once tossed kielbasas into the crowd, promoting Chicopee’s Kielbasa Days. At this meeting, she agreed that wearing a green button promoting Holyoke had an entirely different meaning.
This information is brought to you as a courtesy of the Massachusetts Technology Collaborative's
John Adams Innovation Institute