Sidewalk Labs' Toronto waterfront smart city raises dystopian concerns

2018-08-10T14:40:00-04:00

Sidewalk’s vision for Quayside — as a place populated by self-driving vehicles and robotic garbage collectors, where the urban fabric is embedded with cameras and sensors capable of gleaning information from the phone in your pocket — certainly sounds Orwellian. Yet the company contends that the data gathered from fully wired urban infrastructure is needed to refine inefficient urban systems and achieve ambitious innovations like zero-emission energy grids.

Last fall Sidewalk Labs, a Google-affiliated company, announced plans to build a new smart city model on 12 acres of the Toronto waterfront named Quayside. The design would include infrastructure with sensors and data analytics with the claim of building an overall more streamlined, economical, and green urban space. Sidewalk Labs' partnership with Canada is the beginning of an urban model they hope to expand globally.

While the goal may look utopian, many see an ominous future where governance is under threat rather than the projected promise of urban innovation. Concerns center around tech monopolies, the collection and commodification of city data, and a democratic process of decision making for our environments.

Housing Values: The "Dream House Resource Center" exhibit

2013-08-15T19:37:00-04:00

As for what she wants visitors to get out of the exhibit, Koumoundouros just hopes it will help them think about -- even question -- how much our economy is based on the housing market. 'Ownership and consumption are linked to how much our economy is consumed based," she argues. "[This view of housing] is so specifically American. And I love digging that out, and I think questioning it is part of maybe a shift.'

The phrase "a place to call home" rings loud and clear in the "Dream House Resource Center" exhibit by artist Olga Koumoundouros currently at the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles until August 18. Her exhibit focuses on the commodification of the home in America through the context of America's struggling housing industry and its widespread consequences. The idea came from Koumoundouros' own housing hardships, when her partner was laid off from his architecture job right after they purchased a house in the same week.

Visitors are welcomed in by the giant colorful McMansion doors that Koumoundouros refurbished surrounded by transparent walls. A white board on one side displays the latest headlines and stats in housing. A rainbow-colored timeline of 20th-century American housing on the walls wraps around the exhibit, each strand of the rainbow explaining the different factors leading up to the current state of the U.S. housing industry -- from the idealistic outlook of achieving The...

Archinect - News

Sidewalk Labs' Toronto waterfront smart city raises dystopian concerns

Housing Values: The "Dream House Resource Center" exhibit