At our 2017 Cities Conference Phil Enquist, Leader of SOM’s Urban Planning Group, presented their work on Chongming Island, outside of Shanghai and one of China’s many “smart city” initiatives
The Need To Know, Not Only How We Build, but also What We Build.
The study of Smart Cities and what is meant by the term from an Infrastructure perspective has been a story of great promise and equally frustrating challenge at BuiltWorlds. Even as we found instance after instance of bold and innovative city infrastructure projects in other parts of the world, North America, and particularly the United States, seemed to face particular challenges moving its smart cities conversation into actual brick and mortar projects.
We first launched our exploration of smarter cities and infrastructure, after being shown case studies of cities and mixed use developments like Chongming City, featured above, and the message was clear that in thinking about how to deliver projects more efficiently, it was imperative also to understand the kinds of projects that would be undertaken in the future. The logic was compelling. There was no point in focusing on more efficient delivery of structured parking projects, if ride sharing and other advances in how…