The Surrey Research Park: A Case Study of Strategic Planning for Economic Development
The development of the Surrey Research Park by the University of Surrey is an addition to a number of existing strategies to collaborate with industry that it has developed over its 120 year history. The potential to undertake this development was based on owning a substantial land holding that the University acquired when the Borough Council for the town of Guildford invited the University to relocate from Battersea in London to its new location in 1966. Initial plans for the Park in 1979 were accelerated in 1981 in response to plans by the government to reduce funding for Higher Education in the UK. Beyond a broad master plan for the site that was based on topography and access to the site the plans that were developed were based on a survey of 100 companies that were deemed to be in the target market for the site and a review of the other seven science parks that were being developed in the UK in 1981. The findings from this proved to be important in developing the master plan for the site. Another important influence on the project were the objectives that were defined for the three stakeholders in the project. Those for the University included commercial potential, knowledge transfer and image and reputation; those for the town primarily related to economic development and the plan was to help tenants gain a competitive advantage by locating on the site. In addition a number of success indicators were defined for the project against which to measure performance and have remained as a useful set of parameters on which to base the assessment of the performance of the site. The chapter sets details about the history of the park and covers the success indicators and factors and reviews these in the context of the original objectives for the site.