Persistently high vacancy rates and deep discounts in the US office real estate market are making the case for a reset of central business districts. And Chicago, where a redevelopment campaign for its downtown is just beginning to take shape, may offer its peers a roadmap.

Last year, the University of Chicago launched an annual innovation challenge calling on grad students to pitch plans to revive the city’s core. The most revealing proposals from this year reimagined future business districts as not “monocultures of high-density white-collar work,” contributor Zach Mortice reports, but residential destinations that would attract other demographics — including artists, young professionals and families with kids. Today on CityLab: Struggling Downtowns Are Looking to Lure New Crowds

— Linda Poon

More on CityLab

London’s Serpentine Pavilion Turns 25
This year, the project features ‘A Capsule in Time,’ designed by award-winning Bangladeshi architect Marina Tabassum.

Can Frank Gehry’s ‘Grand LA’ Make Downtown Feel Like a Neighborhood?
A major mixed-use development designed by Gehry introduced housing across from the architect’s Walt Disney Concert Hall. But retail has been slow to follow.

London Tube Carriages Can Be 5C Hotter Than Street in Heat Wave
Unusually hot weather is making it almost unbearable to travel on the UK capital’s underground train network.

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