Controlling Risks Through Flexibility and Urban Integration: The Regeneration of Otaniemi Campus in Finland

Aligning Aalto University’s scientific and economic potential and risk management
with the growing Otaniemi campus takes place with flexible and integrative
spatial and urban concepts. The campus development wants to maximize the
usages of existing resources, optimize the flexibility of uses and minimize fixed
costs of users for changing future as well as to produce urban, street-level places
for enhanced social encounters and open innovation. This living laboratory of
campus development aims at flexibility also in energy production, as well as at
increasing self-sufficiency, made possible by local energy solutions, a smart
utilization of electricity network and by changing consumer behaviour. The new
internal service operator role for renting relevant resources has diminished
surplus areas of academic units and the freed spaces are treated as shared
resources for work, housing and services according to the principle of Building
as a Service (BaaS). New types of gardens support biodiversity cycles. The
university has also implemented on-demand public transportation service
supporting flexible mobility to other campuses. The campus sustainability
programme connects the university with external partners, such as industry,
government, and various organisations of civil society. Through this multi-faceted development, the mono-functional green-field campus receives
company from a new diversified city with mixed-use urban development.
Partnering is crucial, contributing to sharing economical risk, social and
humanitarian programs, sustainability networks, city partnerships, greening
events, and cross-disciplinary academic programs. Along the philosophy of
BaaS, companies and partnering research institutions are welcome to locate their
personnel to the thematic quarters of the campus, supporting co-creation and
empowering the culture-economic ecosystem.