When I think of a smart city, I think of infrastructure that promotes well-coordinated and convenient movements of people, resources and ideas. This improved convenience, however, comes with decisions about what entities will be structurally (both literally and figuratively) supported. In “Traffic in Democracy,” Sorkin reveals the ways in which the city “organizes its prejudices and privileges physically,” namely by outlining how Giuliani’s New York was physically organized to prioritize the car.[1] This organization creates a social hierarchy that becomes imbedded in society. Sorkin describes the importance placed in “flow” in New York – increased speed to save time – and how this results on slower moving bodies deferring to faster ones.[2] This is not inherent, but rather structural. Denmark, for example, has infrastructure that heavily supports the bike as dominant. Bikes have their own lanes, traffic lights, and bridges. In Denmark, the car is the last priority, and their new “smart” technology is in accordance with this. They are developing what is known as a “green wave,” or traffic lights that will give cyclist continuous green lights during rush hour.[3] As Portland transforms into a “smart” city, it should consider updating existing technology to act in accordance with more pedestrian-friendly practices.
Unfortunately, many decisions about physical infrastructures – such as size of roads, capacity for public transportation, etc. – have already been made. Luckily, the advent of “smart” infrastructure, principally virtual infrastructure, has the opportunity to develop and organize itself more democratically. Jiminez discusses the potential for democratization of cities through “open technology,” with equal opportunity to access data and recreate the urban landscape.[4] We must be wary however, of how democratic they may prove to be. Individuals with no access to technology will be entirely isolated from this new form of infrastructure.
While this may seem to be an unusual parallel, “People as Infrastructure” made me think of ways in which people can serve as a different type of infrastructure in a “smart” city. In Johannesburg, interconnected networks of individuals acting as special economic and social links make difficult urban conditions more manageable.[5] The “smart” city also presents opportunities for increasingly large social networks that rely on collaboration and specialized knowledge. While an app may be the medium for information sharing, it is the individual’s initiative to, for example, report the location of a traffic jam, that makes up the content of the new technology. People will, in a virtual world, become a much larger participant in infrastructure than they were in the age when infrastructure was purely the sidewalks and power lines.
[1] Sorkin, Michael. “Introduction: Traffic in Democracy.” In The People, Place and Space Reader, edited by Jen Jack Gieseking, et al, New York: Routledge, 2014. 413.
[2] Sorkin, Michael. “Introduction: Traffic in Democracy.” In The People, Place and Space Reader, edited by Jen Jack Gieseking, et al, New York: Routledge, 2014. 411.
[3] “The Green Wave Spreads,” Copenhaganize.com, October 6th, 2008, http://www.copenhagenize.com/2008/10/green-wave-spreads.html.
[4] Jiménez, Alberto Corsín. “The right to infrastructure: a prototype for open source urbanism.” Environment and Planning: Society and Space 32 (2014): 342-362.
[5] Simone, AbdouMaliq. “People as Infrastructure.” In The People, Place, and Space Reader, edited by Jen Jack Gieseking, et al, New York: Routledge, 2014. 241-246.