All posts by Konstantine

Final Research Paper, Infrastructure

Improving Portlands Public Bus System – Final Research Paper

Improving Portland’s Public Bus System

Konstantine Mushegian

The Digital Image of the City – INTD2430

Professor Jen Jack Gieseking

Abstract

This paper addresses the issue of public transportation in Portland, Maine and offers smart city solutions and policy recommendations that will improve the existing transit system. Technological solutions and policy recommendations proposed at the end of this paper will aim to reduce commute times through the intelligent bus stop placement. Optimal bus stop locations will reduce the average walking time to the bus stop, thus making the public transportation system more accessible and attractive for residents and visitors alike. Portland’s Comprehensive Plan website has only one document that addresses the issues of public transportation in and around the City of Portland. “A Time of Change: Portland Transportation Plan” was proposed to the City Council in July of 1993 by a “Committee of Citizens” [1] but the majority of issues brought up in the plan still seem to exist, almost twenty-two years later. The plan to overhaul Portland transit system that was put together by citizens addresses and tackles issues of intra- neighborhood and inter-neighborhood transportation but no significant changes have been made since 1993. The fact that nothing of importance has been changed is also reinforced by the fact that the only document on the Comprehensive Plan website that touches upon the issues of public transportation is from 1993. I have been regularly reading the minutes from the meetings of the Portland City Council Committee on Transportation, Sustainability and Energy (TSE) for the past couple months. The issue of bus stop placement was brought up at the TSE meeting on September 27, 2014 and a request for proposals was issued in the same month for a Hub Link Feasibility Study in order to “evaluate feasibility of transit routes which will best improve connections between local and regional transportation terminals and major points along the corridors connecting them”[2] but no proposals were received by the deadline of October 17th.

Figure 1

The lack of proposals indicates the inactivity and nonchalance of residents and commuters who are affected by the issue the most. In addition, I will also offer suggestions on how to improve citizen involvement in public issues in this paper.

 

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Post #7: Individual Analysis of Transect Walk

Mapping Trash

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IMG_0376

I chose trashcans as the objective of my transect walk. I had no idea about what I would be looking for when I started walking, however the lack of trashcans struck me right away and I decided that I wanted to see how they are positioned around the city.

The average distance between trashcans in areas frequented by tourists is approximately 150 feet; in areas that are primarily used by residents and commuters, the distance between trashcans is about 500-600 feet.

The placement of trashcans is not something that came up in mental maps or talks with residents, but I still think that it is a very important issue. Proper placement of trashcans will create basis for a cleaner city, and city needs to be clean in both tourist and non-tourist neighborhoods. This is one of the issues that have to be on the list of recommendations to Portland.

I compiled a custom Google Map based on my walk, where I mapped the locations of all trashcans and some other stuff. The exact GPS coordinates of trashcans are also available below. You can access the map here.

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Post #6: Individual Analysis of Ethnography & Mental Maps

West End – Best End, Mental Maps of Portland and Cafe Ethnography

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After collecting mental maps from residents and chatting with them about the city, I realized that there is no single set of smart city recommendations because Portland is different for every single one of its residents. One of the Issues that most interviewees pointed out was the lack of efficient public transportation system. So, I guess there are some recommendations that can make life better and easier for all residents.

See Mentals Maps and Cafe Ethnography inside this post…

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Links of Interest, Tech Tips

What Google has figured out about you?

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I have not been able to get around finishing this blogpost for a while but I had some free time today so here it is.

I was reading an article on The Verge couple weeks ago about internet privacy and algorithms. Readers were encouraged to visit their Google Ad profile to see how much Google had figured out about them based on everyday searches, locations and etc.

You can check how much Google knows about you by following this link. You have to be logged in with your Google account in order to view your profile.

Seeing how much Google knows about me really got me thinking about how advanced data collection algorithms can be; all this data can be used to try and figure out what we might need or want in the future. This is actually being done already. Google’s iPhone app offers routes (based on the time of the day), movies and even travel destinations.

We have talked a lot in class about how a single algorithm or system will never be able to run cities because they are so complex. But if the system can figure out what city needs in real time is it really that impossible?

Assignments, Post #5: Infrastructure Reflections

OpenSource for Better Infrastructure

As cities grow and expand they are obliged to play catch-up with existing transportation technology, successively refitting themselves with systems that do not love them; urban space has been rent and scarred by railways and freeways, clogged and scored by pollution and metal.[1] As cities become smarter more and more layers of complex systems and technologies are built onto them; however, new technologies come at the price of diminishing public space.

As I have mentioned in my previous posts, we should not be judging how smart cities are just by the technologies that they implement. We can put all the technology we want into the city, but these efforts will be fruitless if people will not be able to live in it. A perfect example of this is Masdar City, it has all the imaginable technology but lacks the human character of cities that begins with face to face interactions.[2] Therefore, production of public space should be the central concern when developing infrastructure for smarter cities.

Open Source Urbanism described by Alberto Corsin Jimenez will be the most useful in promoting the common good, because it creates a system designed and managed by citizens eliminating the possibility of infrastructure serving the interests of a small group of people. The most exciting thing about open source urbanism is that in ensures high standards of produced infrastructure by implementing a recursive approach and preserving a permanent beta condition[3] i.e. always leaving room for improvement. Open source urbanism will enable us to create infrastructure that will better serve the needs of the community; Open source approach will also rule out the chance of encountering legacy systems due to the recursive improvement by people for people.

The transition to open source infrastructure is not going to be an easy one and it will definitely pose some challenges. One of the first things that will need to be done when implementing a large open source, peer-to-peer platform is reaching a consensus over methods, protocols, and standards;[4] this is will not only prevent the existence of incompatible systems but will enable us to create smart, universal systems capable of maintaining themselves by analyzing the data received from different parts of the infrastructure (as every part of the open source platform will speak the same language). Another thing that needs to be considered is the ease of making changes – in an open source project a community assumes political and expert management over its infrastructures – a mechanism controlling the ease of making changes will need to be implemented to protect the infrastructure from trolls that will try breaking the system just for the fun of it.

I think Portland could really benefit from the open source infrastructure and crowdsourcing ideas. Crowdsources data could be used by developers for creating efficient transportation apps that would be able to talk to the city infrastructure. Open source urbanism will spark innovation and create more incentive for city dwellers to actively participate in city life, knowing that their voices will be heard and their ideas considered.

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Citations

1.Sorkin, Michael. 2014 [1999]. “Traffic in Democracy.” In The People, Place and Space Reader, edited by Jen Jack Gieseking, et al, 413. New York: Routledge, 2014.

2.Sorkin, Michael. 2014 [1999]. “Traffic in Democracy.” In The People, Place and Space Reader, edited by Jen Jack Gieseking, et al, 413. New York: Routledge, 2014.

3.Jiménez, Alberto Corsín. 2014. “The Right to Infrastructure: a Prototype for Open Source Urbanism.” Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 32 (2): 343.

4.Jiménez, Alberto Corsín. 2014. “The Right to Infrastructure: a Prototype for Open Source Urbanism.” Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 32 (2): 343.

 

Housing, Post #4: Housing Reflections

Depolarizing Cities

Before I start writing about the present condition of public housing and ways of its improvement in the future, I’d like to go over the history of public housing system in the Unites States.

US Public Housing system was created as part of the New Deal, Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s economic recovery plan carried out between 1933 and 1936 in an attempt to restart the US economy after the disastrous effects of the Great Depression. The National Housing Act of 1934, also known as the Capehart Act, led to the creation of the Federal Housing Administration which  sets standards for construction and underwriting and insures loans made by banks and other private lenders for home building. The National Housing Act gave people an opportunity of a fresh start by providing affordable housing as they tried to escape poverty brought around by the economic recession.

The purpose of the housing bill was to provide low-cost housing for struggling citizens; however, as some people got richer than others, they started moving away from the neighborhoods associated with poverty and dirt. At about the same time banks realized that they could make money off urban migration and this brings us to 1960s.

Gentrification, one of the most important events in the history of urban studies, started in 1960s, the term itself was coined in 1964 by British sociologist Ruth Glass to describe the process of poorer residents being displaced by wealthier newcomers. Urban migration based exclusively on economic status resulted in redlining, a practice  followed by banks for categorizing neighborhoods. Gentrification and redlining resulted in the deterioration of disinvested neighborhoods, entire districts starting falling apart causing the decrease of property value. Banks would later acquire this property, fix it and raise the rental price – first, they would pocket the money that should have gone to repairs and upkeep; second, having effectively destroyed the building and established a rent gap, they have produced for themselves the conditions and opportunity for a whole new round of capital reinvestment.[1] People who lived there before were no longer able to afford the rent and they had to move. These processes caused widespread and drastic repolarization of the city along political, economic, cultural and geographic lines since the 1970s.[2]

I have mentioned in my previous posts that smart city is not just a city stuffed with sensors and CCTV cameras; smart city is smart because it approaches issues in novel, smarter ways. Desiree Fields and Sabina Uffer describe the strategies used by investors for promoting turnover rates that include harassing tenants, ignoring their requests and etc. I think that the first thing that needs to be changed is policy. Banks and large corporations should no longer be able to manipulate property prices; cities need policies that will provide tighter control over large property sales and regulate rent. Fields and Uffer describe the  principle of common public interest in their paper – under the principle of the ‘common public interest’ companies limited their profit orientation in exchange for tax exemption, which meant that units were often offered at below marker levels.[3] I think this is something that Portland could benefit from. Implementing this approach will contribute to the promotion of the common good by encouraging private companies to build more housing while keeping it affordable. In this way, we will create “nice” neighborhoods without weeding tenants out and building the frontier myth.

As property ownership transferred from local landlords to globalized investors, the issue of accountability emerged. It is much harder to hold distant investor-landlords socially, legally and politically accountable at the local level.[4] The lack of communication between tenants and people responsible for property maintenance causes the deterioration of existing housing which in turn creates basis for turnover of units and deregulation of rent-stabilised apartments.[5]

Accountability problem can be solved by a creating an open platform where citizens will be able to report issues to globalized investor-landlords. Requests will have to be routed through appropriate government agencies that will ensure their completion by private owners. Policies obliging private companies to complete the requests should also be created; this will add another layer of security for tenants and decrease the chance of real estate market manipulations.

We need to create public housing that will be affordable and secure.  This can be done by creating policies and fostering communication between single tenants and entities responsible for housing. Cities should no longer be artificially polarized, but should act as communities united under the goal of common good to create decent living conditions for every citizen.

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Citations

1. Smith, Neil. The People, Place, and Space Reader. Taylor & Francis, 2014. 317. Print.

2.  Smith, Neil. The People, Place, and Space Reader. Taylor & Francis, 2014. 315. Print.

3. Fields, Desiree, and Sabina Uffer. The Financialisation of Rental Housing: A Comparative Analysis of New York City and Berlin. Urban Studies, July. 3. Print.

4. Fields, Desiree, and Sabina Uffer. The Financialisation of Rental Housing: A Comparative Analysis of New York City and Berlin. Urban Studies, July. 4. Print.

5. Fields, Desiree, and Sabina Uffer. The Financialisation of Rental Housing: A Comparative Analysis of New York City and Berlin. Urban Studies, July. 13. Print.

Post #3: Public Space Reflections

Ancient Agora in a Future City

Men vote to ostracize a fellow citizen in the Athenian Agora. – H.M. HERGET/National Geographic Creative

Agora was the central element of social and political life in Ancient Greece; it greatly contributed to the development of Greek democracy as it was a place for people to come together, share ideas and vote on issues. Agora was the first public space as we know them today, and it has undergone many transformations over the centuries. Agoras shifted to Salons in the 19th century. Salons were interior places where people went to see and to be seen. The difference between Greek agora and European salon is not hard to see, however, the their purpose has been the same.

“Alexander Pushkin and his friends listening to Mitskevich in the salon of Duchess Zinaida Volonskaia” 1907. Pushkin Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia

We have neither agoras nor salons today, and it seems like public space is shifting once again. The difference is that we have never had as much control over these shifts as we do today. As we supervise the shift of public space to its new form, we should focus on preserving five core qualities of public space, which are

  1. Freedom of Access
  2. Freedom of Action
  3. Freedom of Claim
  4. Freedom of Change
  5. Freedom of Ownership

Protecting these freedoms will become extremely important in smart cities full of sensors and other data collection devices. No matter how much forward we move technologically, public spaces should remain areas where these freedoms can be exercised.

In his article “To Go Again to Hyde Park” Don Mitchell writes, public space is uncontrolled space, space of anarchy,[1] spaces owned by people. We talked about the events that took place in Central Park in 1989 and the only way of avoiding such incidents is the elimination of anarchy from public spaces, which is mostly accomplished through authority control. So, we want control of public spaces but we also want all of the freedoms described above. To be honest, I have no idea how this can be accomplished, but I hope to come up with something by the end of the semester.

Another factor affecting public spaces is privatization and commercialization [of everything]. Often times, corporations are more willing to invest money into public spaces, but investments usually come at a price of limiting participation to those who can afford it[2] or those who belong to a particular socioeconomic class. However, privatization does not necessarily have to be bad and deteriorating; people have come up with innovative ways of using private funding for the common good.

HBO Bryant Park Summer Film Festival

In 1980, Daniel Biederman and Andrew Heiskell founded Bryant Park Corporation with a mission to reclaim Bryant Park for the people of New York City.[3] Bryant Park Corporation is a perfect example of public-private partnerships that enable private funds to be used for the common good [of the city and citizens]. BPC lists creating “rich and dynamic visual, cultural and intellectual outdoor experience” and helping “prevent crime and disorder in the park by attracting thousands of patrons, at all hours, thus fostering a safe environment” in the first paragraph of its mission statement. This is all that public spaces need!

Public-private partnerships do not necessarily mean plastering investor’s logos all over the park; corporations love branding and people love corporations that care about them.  Thus, every corporation would love to have a park associated with its name: people develop emotional connections to places; a branded place would automatically instigate an emotional connection to the brand in the person.

Public-private partnerships are definitely something that Portland could benefit from. The lack of parks was easy to notice during our field trip, but more importantly existing parks clearly lacked attention. The first step to developing public-private partnerships would be creating an action group within the Portland City Council that will produced proposals to private corporations for the revitalization of public spaces (while preserving the core freedoms). In 1974 Henry Lefebvre published “The Production of Space”, a book that is relevant to the present day. Lefebvre argued that space is produced and I have to agree with this statement. There might have been a time in history when public spaces could emerge out of nowhere, but this is impossible in the conditions of a modern city. Therefore, we should be carefully planning public spaces so that they are effective in a modern city and in the smarter city of the future while serving the purpose of the common good.

 

Public space has been shifting based on the needs of the society but its function to provide a place for sharing and expressing ideas has remained the same for thousands of years. As we move toward smarter cities, we should be focusing in preserving the core freedoms while integrating public spaces with new technologies. I would like to end this blogpost with a quote from Setha Low: a postindustrial plaza where the imagery and imagination of all communities, children and seniors, workers and retirees, residents and visitors, will then find public expression.[4]

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Citations

1. Mitchell, Don. The People, Place, and Space Reader. Hoboken: Taylor and Francis, 2014. 192-196. Print.

2. Sorkin, Michael, and Setha Low. After the World Trade Center: Rethinking New York City. New York: Routledge, 2002. 164. Print.

3. “Bryant Park.” Bryant Park. Web. 1 Oct. 2014.

4. Sorkin, Michael, and Setha Low. After the World Trade Center: Rethinking New York City. New York: Routledge, 2002. 171. Print.

 

Infrastructure, Post #2: From Policy to Recommendation, Public Space, Uncategorized

5 Ideas For a Better Smart City

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Rapid technological progress over the past 20-30 years has made us  very dependent on the computers that are in our backpacks, pockets and even wrists. As humans got more used to using technology in everyday life, some of the humans came up with the idea of a Smart Cities that are built upon technologies that we love so much. But, what exactly is a smart city and what role do humans play in it, if any at all.

There are couple of Smart City projects around the world: Masdar City in the oil-rich United Arab Emirates or the Korean New Songdo. Adam Greenfield, in his book “Against the Smart City” describes the developers of these cities in a following way: It’s that their developers appear to lack any feel for the ways in which cities actually generate value for the people who live in them[1]. And it is hard to disagree with Greenfield. I came across this video featuring Masdar City – an empty city populated solely by robots.

After watching this video, I asked myself a question: Would I want to live in a city like Masdar? where everything is automated and there is nothing for humans to do except for enjoy the ultimate lifestyle and work experience[2]. Cities like Masdar or New Songdo will probably not be populated by anyone who is alive today, because such a drastic change of lifestyle is hard. However, there are ways in which technology can be applied to existing cities without sucking sole out of them and converting them to dense settlements[3], where only robots can hear you scream.

1. Buses That Arrive On Time
Portland, ME Bus Stop

Availability, reliability and performance of public transportation is crucial to the city and its performance.

2. More & Better Parks
Lincoln Park

During a two hour walk in Portland, I only noticed 3 or 4 parks and most of them were decrepit, had benches in awkward places and grass was not cut evenly. This creates a very uninviting and repelling atmosphere. Location of the park also matters;

3. Maps, Schedules, Everything – Digital & Easily Accessible

Tbilisi Bus Stop

This a photo of a smart bus stop in Tbilisi, Georgia. The screen displays bus ETA, air temperature and time in Georgian and English which really makes it easier for tourists to get around. The screen also acts as a wifi hotspot. As there are bus stops all around the city, it automatically became covered by a publicly available wifi network. Portland could also implement this kind of system; an app that provides access to schedules and city maps could also be developed.

4. More, Easily Available Public Spaces

Anything from stairs in front of the building to the communal tennis court can count as a public space, so there is no photo for this one. It is extremely important for city dwellers to have places to take a break from the rhythm of the city. Developing such areas will create basis for a happier and healthier population.

5. Data Collection For A Good Cause
Power of Crowdsourcing
Data collection does not necessarily involve CCTV cameras and sensors that feed data to a closed, centralized system. Data collection can be a process open to the public. In fact, Open Data is even better because it creates opportunities for innovation and entrepreneurship. I think Portland could really benefit from an open-source crowdsourced data collection platform, where citizens could upload photos and geolocations of places that need fixing or renovation.

Some of the ideas above have to seem no connection with each other; however, there is one thing uniting them: all of them can be implemented using the same technology that powers smart cities like Masdar or New Songdo without devaluing humans in the city ecosystem.

The best thing about these ideas is that implementing any one of them will spark the development of the other by rising public demand. A more reliable public transportation system will encourage people to leave their cars at home and go for walks (knowing they will not have to walk all the way back – they will be able to take a bus!). More people going for walks will encourage development and growth of public spaces which will create opportunities for outdoor performances and street artists.

However, implementing a crowdsourced open data collection platform excites me the most. This data could be used to figure out where to place parks and where to put bus lines; tracking the location of people in parks would enable planners to place benches in relevant places. The openness of this data, would enable 3rd party developers to create even better apps to power the city life through applications that could be targeted at people living in specific locations or of a specific demographic.

Opportunities are limitless, we just need to implement technology without removing life from the city.

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Citations

1. Greenfield, Adam (2013-12-20). Against the smart city (The city is here for you to use) (Kindle Locations 306-307). Do projects. Kindle Edition.

2. Greenfield, Adam (2013-12-20). Against the smart city (The city is here for you to use) (Kindle Location 86). Do projects. Kindle Edition.

3. Greenfield, Adam (2013-12-20). Against the smart city (The city is here for you to use) (Kindle Location 47). Do projects. Kindle Edition.

Post #1: Research Topic & Group

Urban Population, Public Spaces and Infrastructure

Urban population has been growing at an almost exponential rate during the past decades. According to the statistics provided by the World Health Organization, the urban population in 2014 represented 54% of the total global population, a great increase from 34% in 1960, and according to approximations it is expected to grow by another 1.84% per year between 2015 and 2020.

The vast influx of people into the cities has made urban planning a much harder job. Larger urban population results in the increased amount of architecturally unfit buildings that are built in a rush to accommodate the increasing number of people, cars and an extended demand for infrastructure which often results in the reduction and/or diminishment of the public space.

I would like to be a part of Public Space research group, because I’d like to examine how infrastructure is affecting public spaces in cities, and what kind of work is being done to prevent this interference. Public spaces are an important part of the city. They contribute greatly to forming communities in busy city environments. I came across Project for Public Spaces yesterday. It is a pretty interesting organization that helps people create and maintain public spaces that build stronger communities. You can see some of the projects they have done here.

Guy Debord’s “Theory of the Dérive and Definitions” has significantly influenced my topic choice. I really liked the idea of a dérive which is not possible if the streets are not suited for pedestrians. It is impossible to “to drop relations … and other usual motives for movement and action, and … be drawn by the attractions of the terrain” if one risks getting hit by a car in a busy city street with narrow sidewalks. The importance of public spaces like parks will increase even more as cities become smarter and covered with sensors, because these spaces will become destination points who will want to take a break from constant tracking.

I grew up in the middle of the city myself and have always felt the lack of public spaces around my neighborhood. This is another reason why I want to study the relationship between public spaces and infrastructure; I want to learn how infrastructure can be better integrated into the city so that public spaces are left untouched.