Round table on Real-Time Cities

I set up a round table at the SENSEable City Lab on “Real-Time Cities” that will take place before Adam Greenfield’s talk next Monday (April 14th 2008, 2pm-5pm. Room 3-401). The pitch goes as follows:

The real-time city is now real! The increasing deployment of sensors and hand-held electronics in recent years is allowing a new approach to the study of the built environment. The way we describe and understand cities is being radically transformed – alongside the tools we use to design them and impact on their physical structure. The goal of this round table is to discuss and anticipate these changes from a critical point of view.

We will cover the theme of “Real-time cities” with specific discussions on (but not limited to): New resources to describe cities, the implication of the deployment of ubiquitous and sensors technologies on the reconfiguration of cities, the city as a platform for innovation, and what is a good real-time city?

I took the advantage the 2008 Association of American Geographers annual meeting to bring together some people who’s work I admire to discuss research works and visions linked to “urban computing” (“the integration of computing, sensing, and actuation technologies in everyday urban settings and lifestyles“). I am pretty confident in the line-up of main speakers:

+ Georg Gartner, Vienna University of Technology
+ Adam Greenfield, Nokia Design and NYU
+ Jonathan Raper, City University London
+ Carlo Ratti, MIT SENSEable City Lab
+ Raj Singh, MIT/Open Geospatial Consortium
+ Paul Torrens, Arizona State University

Unfortunately, I could not bring a female voice to this list. Hopefully it will come from the attendance.