Establishment of a Knowledge Hub

Although the 18th District already hosts a TUD18 Knowledge Centre, its capacity, thematic coverage and institutional linkages are not yet sufficient to serve as a fully integrative urban innovation hub. The challenge is to expand the district’s knowledge infrastructure by creating a second knowledge hub that complements and enhances the existing one — facilitating knowledge exchange, civic innovation, cross-sector collaboration and capacity development. This new hub should anchor interdisciplinarity, co-creation and continuous learning in the local governance ecosystem, while connecting with European counterparts.
The TUD18 Knowledge Centre functions as a local centre for educational programs, training, community workshops and lifelong learning in the district. It also provides space for municipal events and local stakeholder gatherings.
However, given growing demands for more dynamic, project-based, research-oriented, cross-sectoral and innovation-driven functions (e.g. urban experimentation, data hosting, citizen science, policy labs), the current centre’s structure is limited.
Hence the ambition to establish a new knowledge hub that builds on TUD18’s foundation but extends its reach — by integrating more advanced capacities (data, R&D, networks) and serving as a strategic node linking local, national and European knowledge ecosystems.
Through this City-to-City Exchange, the 18th District will co-develop a blueprint for a second, complementary District Knowledge Hub. The hub will strengthen local capacities to host research, data-driven projects, participatory labs and policy experiments. It will foster collaboration between municipal departments, civil society, academia and private actors, underpinning the district’s role as an innovation-driven urban node. It will also contribute to aligning the district more strongly with European networks of knowledge hubs and innovation ecosystems, thus raising the visibility and impact of local development.