There are many elements of a city. Of course, there are the three overarching subjects that we as a class are focusing on: housing, public space, and infrastructure. Housing is necessary because without it there would be no people inhabiting the city. Public spaces are also vital because they can be used by everyone and make possible encounters and events that would not occur in private areas like workplaces and homes. Unlike housing and public space, infrastructure quite literally makes a city a city. Roads and bridges – edges – connect isolated locations – nodes – to form a greater place known as the city. There are numerous forms of infrastructure, each of which is suited to a different type of city or environment. Areas with a large number of people and businesses might benefit from roads and highways, for example. In a less busy area, sidewalks might be more appropriate than massive freeways. As with anything, determining which types of infrastructure are the best requires context.
There are myriad types of infrastructure useful in the smart city. One of the most promising and relatively new areas of infrastructure is that of digital technology. In the so-called “Silicon Age” we live in, computers seem to have limitless potential for the ways in which they can improve our lives. While public Wi-Fi, Ethernet, and fiber optic networks are of course practical in any modern city, infrastructure does not need to be limited to the physical realm: websites and apps can be just as useful as any physical network. To use an example of which I’m sure most Bowdoin students are aware, the Bowdoin dining app makes those difficult-to-make decisions regarding where to eat that much easier. These applications do not need to be limited to a single developer: the NYC subway application contest we discussed in class is a fantastic example of how the public can be brought together to create something that benefits everyone. [1] The MTA App Quest Challenge is a perfect example of one of the main ideas discussed by Alberto Corsín Jiménez in his paper “The Right to Infrastructure”: “in beta” infrastructure. [2] Furthermore, the crowdsourced nature of the MTA App Quest Challenge takes advantage of the talents of everyone in the community who wants to contribute. This is much like what Jiménez refers to as the “open source” model. [2] This model does not only apply to smart cities, however; it also has tremendous implications for any society.
What is so great about the open source model of creating infrastructure is that anyone and everyone can contribute to a project to make it better. Jiménez gives many examples, such as the El Campo in Madrid and the Inteligencias Colectivas initiative. [2] As El Campo shows, open infrastructural projects may have nothing to do with digital technology. Whether they are physical or digital instances of infrastructure, open source projects have the potential to help and empower communities in ways unlike any other. Again going back to the example of El Campo, the forum of people governing the space – known as La Mesa – met with Madrid’s City Hall less than two years after its creation. As Jiménez states, “This move challenged almost thirty years of urban politics in Madrid, where City Hall had long ignored all citizen claims that were not channelled through local Neighborhood Associations.” [2] Open source projects have the potential to give people a voice who otherwise would have none. Surely this is a promising model of infrastructure for promoting the common good. By giving everyone a voice and the ability to directly impact the city, infrastructure can best serve everyone.
This open source model is already starting to have an impact on Portland. Below is a user-created map of bike paths in the city: [3]
As we can see from this map, there are several, but not lots of bike paths in Portland. One way Portland could improve would be to have more transportation options for people trying to get around the city. Currently, there are limited public transportation options and few other ways of getting around the city other than walking and driving. Although Portland is a very walkable city, it would be nice for people without cars to have faster ways of getting around. Taking inspiration from our class discussion about bicycle lanes in Berlin, I think a greater abundance of bike lanes in Portland would certainly benefit those who want to quickly get across the city without having to drive. Currently, bicyclists have to choose between riding on the sidewalk or riding on the road, neither of which were designed for bicycles. As Michael Sorkin puts it, “Modern city planning is structured around [. . .] conflict avoidance. Elevated highways, pedestrian skyways, subway systems, and other movement technologies clarify relations between classes of vehicles for the sake of efficient flow.” [4] While it might be a stretch to say Portland needs to be reworked to incorporate subway systems and pedestrian skyways, having bike lanes would make traveling much easier for cyclists.
[1] “Home,” MTA App Quest, accessed October 8, 2014, http://2013mtaappquest.challengepost.com/.
[2] Alberto Corsín Jiménez, “The Right to Infrastructure: A Prototype for Open Source Urbanism,” Environment and Planning D: Society and Space, volume 32 (2014): 342–362.
[3] Gordon Harris, “Bicycle Routes in Portland Maine,” Cycling Routes in New England (blog), March 2011, http://cyclingnewengland.blogspot.com/2011/03/bicycle-routes-in-portland-maine.html.
[4] Michael Sorkin, “Traffic in Democracy,” in The People, Place and Space Reader, ed. Jen Jack Gieseking et al. (New York, Routledge), 411–415.