Infostructures: Towards a Complementary Approach for Solving Urban Challenges through Digital Technologies

Abstract

Population growth in cities has led to unprecedented pressure on urban infrastructure services, such as electricity supply and public transport. As a consequence cities need to find sustainable solutions to maintain the availability of services while keeping them economically and environmentally viable. One traditional approach is to expand infrastructure, but this can be expensive, take years from planning to realization, and be politically frought. In this paper we discuss the concept of “infostructures” as cost and time-effective complementary approaches that leverage digital layers and urban digital media channels of the cityscape. Through four case studies and their analysis we illustrate opportunities for addressing different types of “unhealthy” situations with digital technologies.

Keywords:

• interaction design
• media architecture
• urban displays
• transport environments
• energy feedback
• smart city
• urban informatics

Acknowledgments

The research is partly funded through the ARC Linkage project LP110200708 “Responsive transport environments: spatial and visual user information technologies to allow improved passenger flow and a better customer experience.” We would like to thank everyone who directly or indirectly contributed to the research through conversations and discussions that led to the ARC Linkage project and this paper. TripStats was initially developed as design concept by Tamara Chahine. Forward Motion is a concept developed by Oliver Petrie.

Notes on Contributors

Martin Tomitsch is a senior lecturer in the Faculty of Architecture, Design and Planning at the University of Sydney, director of the Design Computing program, and founding member of the Media Architecture Institute. Originally trained in informatics, he has worked as interaction design researcher in Vienna, Paris, and Reykjavik. He currently works at the Sydney Design Lab, an interdisciplinary research group at the University of Sydney.

M. Hank Haeusler is a senior lecturer in the School of Architecture at the University of New South Wales, Sydney, and director of the Media Architecture Institute. He is known as a researcher, educator, entrepreneur, and designer in media architecture, digital technology, and ubiquitous computing, and author of five books, several book chapters and conference papers.