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Utopian attempts to build cities almost always fail. "the real-world urban design and planning of infrastructure and public spaces" from the 19609's brought us

Utopian attempts to build cities almost always fail. "the real-world urban design and planning of infrastructure and public spaces" from the 19609's brought us empty downtowns, sprawling suburbs, lack of culture and cars everywhere. The notion of a 'tech first' place is almost repulsive. Humans are people, who about 'people first'? How about the fact that we have been 'iterating' already for thousands of years on this one? 'Munich' is a great city precisely because it is old, and it will never be great 'because tech'. Utopianism is one of the most consistently apparent acts of crude hubris among technologies and ideologues, and it blows me away because there is so much in recent history to show how exemplarily bad it can all be. Basically the entire Soviet Union and satellite Empire speaks to this. Visit anywhere in Eastern Europe and see the 'revolutionary people's Utopias' built on 'reason, technology and equality' ... my god man. All of that said - it's good to experiment and if some college town wants to 'go tech' from Google, then that might be a good idea. As for Google's 'Toronto Harbourfront' initiative ... no.

lisper 8y ago
> almost always fail Almost always? What would you cite as a success?
- jhpriestley 8y ago
  Salt Lake City? Constantinople? Saint Petersburg?
  - sonnyblarney 8y ago
    Those are interesting examples. But was Salt Lake City designed as an urban opportunity, or was it really a group of people who simply wanted to make their version of society? With the Mormons it would rather seem they were 'a people' of some sort, and they 'made do' with their environment, as opposed to a specific objective of building society around tech. And are either Constantinople or St. Petersbourg planned? Or rather were there just significant government / centrally-planned bits of civic infrastructure after the fact? I don't think anyone would reject the notion of 'tech' in a city, for example 'a subway' or 'universal wifi' - or maybe specific lanes/tunnels for little robots to deliver all of our stuff (!) ... ... but rather the notion of a city started from scratch with utility, specifically fancy utility in mind. Maybe we could look at places, figure out what they need, and do that well, using technology. In some places it might mean a little bit of upheaval that's fine, if the benefits are at least tangible, unlike the whole Google Toronto thing which seems like civic vaporware to me.
- abecedarius 8y ago
  Alexandria wasn't utopian afaik, but it was a planned city that seems to have been a success right away.
  - lisper 8y ago
    Are you referring to Virginia or Egypt?
    - abecedarius 8y ago
      Egypt. https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2016/mar/14/story-cities-day-1-alexandria-egypt-history-urbanisation-foundations-modern-world https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2016/mar/14/story-cities-...
PavlovsCat 8y ago
> All fine architectural values are human values, else not valuable. -- Frank Lloyd Wright, "The Living City" (1958)
- srtjstjsj 8y ago
  That's ironic considering that Wright was famous for building that looked beautiful but were uncomfortable and poor-functioning.
  - PavlovsCat 8y ago
    Since confort and function both relate to humans living in these buildings, I'd say you're criticizing the buildings based on human values and therefore confirming the quote :P Maybe he was so pleased with himself after making that unassailable observation, which will still be valid long after nothing of the buildings remain, that that it went to his head and impacted his work negatively? I have no idea, I just like the quote ^^
  - theoh 8y ago
    The buildings have fine architectural values, just not necessarily fine use values. There's no paradox here. It's building as art. Any human aesthetic judgment is human by definition.
  - erikpukinskis 8y ago
    Are you confusing Wright with Gehry? FLW has a reputation for making human scale spaces, designed around what inhabitants would do with it. There’s customs built furniture, custom fittings. Gehry is designing 3D sculptures that don’t seem meant to live in. Although most of FLW’s residential work in LA is foreboding and not particularly suited to living in. I’ll give you that. But it’s not really typical of his career. He was in mourning.
  - 1123581321 8y ago
    This is not true. Anecdotal, but I just toured a house Wright built for a veteran in a wheelchair and was pleased at how much thought went into the height and reachability of all the interior areas, in addition to the quality of the structure and the exterior.
saalweachter 8y ago
Basically, to build a city you have to be able to answer the question "why would anyone move there?", and the only correct answer is "because there are jobs people want there". And since we're talking utopian cities, there's two follow up questions. "What will your revision process look like when you realize your initial design was fundamentally flawed and it's time to throw one away?" and "How will you maintain control when people are tired of you playing Sim City with their lives and there's more of them than you?"
- nojvek 8y ago
  I agree with utopian thinking really doesn’t work. For people to stay in a city, they need to have meaning in their life. That meaning is provided through multiple ways, a nice impactful job, good schools and universities, family housing, walkable/bikeable roads to shops and restaurants. In a way, you are 100% correct, most desirable cities will always be most human happiness/friendliness focused cities. Tech will merely be a means to that end. Tech is always a means to an end. People don’t want fancy self driving cars with a 100 sensors, they just want to get from point A to point B quickly and comfortably. A city with well networked subway system beats a city full of self driving cars stuck in a traffic jam. It’s so easy to fall in the trap of loving solution rather than the loving the problem.
  - sonnyblarney 8y ago
    "most desirable cities will always be most human happiness/friendliness focused cities" No, they will be the richest with the coolest stuff to do. Paris is not a happy/friendly city. In fact, most places are happier than NY, Paris, London. Also, most people don't move so functional cities are not so much aspirational as the people that live there are lucky!
kenneth 8y ago
They sometimes work fine when they're built by Governments. See Brasilia, Canberra, or even D.C.
- sonnyblarney 8y ago
  Well DC is one of the most violent places in the world. And the places that are not the most violent benefit from obscene cash infusions and 2x normal salary, to the point where real-estate in 'non violent' DC is unbearably expensive, moreover, DC was 'designed' a long time ago, also, the streets that were 'designed' are not the things that make it nice. I see your points though - really creative aspects of urban planning, infused with some kind of true cause or design, maybe can yield some interesting things. But most suburbs are not that. They're just places with extra wide roads, pre-planned access to shopping etc..

lisper 8y ago

> almost always fail Almost always? What would you cite as a success?

jhpriestley 8y ago
Salt Lake City? Constantinople? Saint Petersburg?
- sonnyblarney 8y ago
  Those are interesting examples. But was Salt Lake City designed as an urban opportunity, or was it really a group of people who simply wanted to make their version of society? With the Mormons it would rather seem they were 'a people' of some sort, and they 'made do' with their environment, as opposed to a specific objective of building society around tech. And are either Constantinople or St. Petersbourg planned? Or rather were there just significant government / centrally-planned bits of civic infrastructure after the fact? I don't think anyone would reject the notion of 'tech' in a city, for example 'a subway' or 'universal wifi' - or maybe specific lanes/tunnels for little robots to deliver all of our stuff (!) ... ... but rather the notion of a city started from scratch with utility, specifically fancy utility in mind. Maybe we could look at places, figure out what they need, and do that well, using technology. In some places it might mean a little bit of upheaval that's fine, if the benefits are at least tangible, unlike the whole Google Toronto thing which seems like civic vaporware to me.
abecedarius 8y ago
Alexandria wasn't utopian afaik, but it was a planned city that seems to have been a success right away.
- lisper 8y ago
  Are you referring to Virginia or Egypt?
  - abecedarius 8y ago
    Egypt. https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2016/mar/14/story-cities-day-1-alexandria-egypt-history-urbanisation-foundations-modern-world https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2016/mar/14/story-cities-...

PavlovsCat 8y ago

> All fine architectural values are human values, else not valuable. -- Frank Lloyd Wright, "The Living City" (1958)

srtjstjsj 8y ago
That's ironic considering that Wright was famous for building that looked beautiful but were uncomfortable and poor-functioning.
- PavlovsCat 8y ago
  Since confort and function both relate to humans living in these buildings, I'd say you're criticizing the buildings based on human values and therefore confirming the quote :P Maybe he was so pleased with himself after making that unassailable observation, which will still be valid long after nothing of the buildings remain, that that it went to his head and impacted his work negatively? I have no idea, I just like the quote ^^
- theoh 8y ago
  The buildings have fine architectural values, just not necessarily fine use values. There's no paradox here. It's building as art. Any human aesthetic judgment is human by definition.
- erikpukinskis 8y ago
  Are you confusing Wright with Gehry? FLW has a reputation for making human scale spaces, designed around what inhabitants would do with it. There’s customs built furniture, custom fittings. Gehry is designing 3D sculptures that don’t seem meant to live in. Although most of FLW’s residential work in LA is foreboding and not particularly suited to living in. I’ll give you that. But it’s not really typical of his career. He was in mourning.
- 1123581321 8y ago
  This is not true. Anecdotal, but I just toured a house Wright built for a veteran in a wheelchair and was pleased at how much thought went into the height and reachability of all the interior areas, in addition to the quality of the structure and the exterior.

saalweachter 8y ago

Basically, to build a city you have to be able to answer the question "why would anyone move there?", and the only correct answer is "because there are jobs people want there". And since we're talking utopian cities, there's two follow up questions. "What will your revision process look like when you realize your initial design was fundamentally flawed and it's time to throw one away?" and "How will you maintain control when people are tired of you playing Sim City with their lives and there's more of them than you?"

nojvek 8y ago
I agree with utopian thinking really doesn’t work. For people to stay in a city, they need to have meaning in their life. That meaning is provided through multiple ways, a nice impactful job, good schools and universities, family housing, walkable/bikeable roads to shops and restaurants. In a way, you are 100% correct, most desirable cities will always be most human happiness/friendliness focused cities. Tech will merely be a means to that end. Tech is always a means to an end. People don’t want fancy self driving cars with a 100 sensors, they just want to get from point A to point B quickly and comfortably. A city with well networked subway system beats a city full of self driving cars stuck in a traffic jam. It’s so easy to fall in the trap of loving solution rather than the loving the problem.
- sonnyblarney 8y ago
  "most desirable cities will always be most human happiness/friendliness focused cities" No, they will be the richest with the coolest stuff to do. Paris is not a happy/friendly city. In fact, most places are happier than NY, Paris, London. Also, most people don't move so functional cities are not so much aspirational as the people that live there are lucky!

kenneth 8y ago

They sometimes work fine when they're built by Governments. See Brasilia, Canberra, or even D.C.

sonnyblarney 8y ago
Well DC is one of the most violent places in the world. And the places that are not the most violent benefit from obscene cash infusions and 2x normal salary, to the point where real-estate in 'non violent' DC is unbearably expensive, moreover, DC was 'designed' a long time ago, also, the streets that were 'designed' are not the things that make it nice. I see your points though - really creative aspects of urban planning, infused with some kind of true cause or design, maybe can yield some interesting things. But most suburbs are not that. They're just places with extra wide roads, pre-planned access to shopping etc..