Abstract
In recent decades, cities have been changing profoundly, in terms of infrastructures, social dynamics, and even their own identities, and the process of change is continuous – hence the concept of “urban identities in the making”. Leveraging on interdisciplinary approaches and methods, ranging from design to human geography, our study aimed at grasping the urban identity of Bolzano – a city with unique features – in its current evolutionary stage and providing hints for planning its future development. Findings reveal a multifaceted city with different identities, one of which is that of a city with a strong potential for research and innovation. Research institutes and centers, such as the Free University of Bolzano, Eurac Research, and others, can be drivers of positive change for the city, e.g., by encouraging and accelerating innovation, fostering spill-over effects between the city’s different economic sectors and helping the city to change its centripetal logic and revitalizing its more peripheral districts.