The next city and complex adaptive systems

Abstract

Urban futures are typically conceptualized as starting anew; an urban future is usually represented as a quest for an ideal state, replacing the status quo with visionary statement about ‘better’ futures. Repeatedly, propositions reinvent the way we live, work and play. The major urban innovations for the changing cityscape from the last 100 years, however, have opportunistically taken advantage of unprecedented technical developments in infrastructure rather than be drawn from architectural inventions in their right, such as telecommunications, services, utilities, point-to-point rapid transit including the elevator. Howard’s Garden City therefore presaged the suburb, just as Le Corbusier e..