New York City Deputy Mayor for Housing and Economic Development Alicia Glen recently announced the selection of the NYU Tandon School of Engineering to “develop and operate” the “first government funded VR/AR center” for education, training, research, investment and business creation in a 15,000 square foot space in the Brooklyn Navy Yard. In the Bronx, CUNY (City University of New York) Lehman College’s VR/AR Training Academy and Development Lab will prepare students for careers in the virtual and augmented reality industries.

Speaking in a first-floor wing (known as the ‘MakerSpace’) of Tandon’s 6 Metrocenter building in Brooklyn, Glen described a $6 million inter-county investment by the New York City Economic Development Corporation (NYCEDC) and the Mayor’s Media Office. and Entertainment (MOME). The lab-hub’s ambitions to merge VR and AR education, business activities, and corporate enterprise echo those of the NYC Media Lab, a public-private partnership founded by NYCEDC that operates out of 2 Metrocenter. In fact, NYC Media Lab CEO Justin Hendrix was on hand for the announcement and praised his role in driving the deal.

The ad says that the incubator will provide the following:

• Support new ventures. Provide workspace, equipment, infrastructure, and seed-stage capital to startups, and connect them with a community of mentors and investors through key program partners. Encourage the creation of new businesses through entrepreneurial programs and resources.
• Increase access and expand your talent pipeline. Establish a presence at the CUNY Lehman College VR/AR Training Academy to develop a citywide pipeline of VR/AR talent. Build a curriculum of executive and professional education programs. Offer hands-on learning opportunities, internships, and scholarships for students.
• Research. Create the preeminent VR/AR research center in the country by leveraging the expertise of faculty and students from NYU, Columbia University, CUNY, The New School, and other partner institutions to push the boundaries of technological advancement in these fields and create the advancement of new ventures emerge.
• Build a VR/AR community. Convene investors, university researchers, leaders from various industries, and civic and cultural partners through programs and events.
• Stimulate corporate VR/AR innovation. Offer membership and consulting services to companies, including access to start-ups and projects, and corporate innovation programs designed to prototype new solutions and launch start-ups.

The measure is part of Mayor Bill de Blasio’s New York Works initiative, whose goal, the mayor cites in the press release, “stimulate 100,000 well-paying jobs in ten years,” many of them in technology and related sectors. According to the press release and repeated statements ad nauseam during the event, “the laboratory will directly create more than 500 jobs in the next ten years.” First, of course, you have to open; that is scheduled to happen near the end of 2017.

Deputy Mayor Glen wasn’t the only city official to speak out. Councilman and Economic Development Committee Chairman Daniel R. Garodnick, who represents a motley mass of Midtown Manhattan neighborhoods that includes what many say is the city’s unmistakable waterhole, Murray Hill, appeared in Brooklyn to promote the ” silicone alley,” a singular a grim dash of dad-joke marketing coined, of course, in the ’90s. One struggles to imagine drawing anyone to New York in 2017. Media and Entertainment Commissioner Julie Menin he kindly refrained from using the term during his comments.