Vol.01 – Enhancing Places through Technology

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    Enhancing Places through Technology
    (Edições Universitárias Lusófonas, 2017) Zammit, Antoine, ed.; Kenna,Therese, ed.
    The Brazilian city of Curitiba, capital of the Southern state of Parana, is well-known globally for a series of interesting planning initiatives and choices promoted through its recent history by some of its administrators, amongst which probably the most prominent has been the architect-planner Jaime Lerner. One of the most notable pieces of innovation in the city, enjoying a global resonance, was the original design of the mass transport system known as Bus Rapid Transit (BRT). Thanks to various ideas, mainly related to the ‘tube’ design of the bus stops and the consequent affordance of a very fast exchange of alighting and boarding passengers, the operations of the BRT’s long buses could be almost as efficient as that of an underground system. The story of the design and evolution of the BRT presents an interesting – albeit indirect – point of reflection for those involved in efforts of ‘smartening up’ the city through the application of technology. Lerner often tells the story of bus drivers solving through an extremely simple and low-tech idea – the application of two small marks on the bus’s window and the stop’s structure to allow drivers to always stop at exactly the same position – a problem that otherwise would have called for complex and expensive hi-tech solutions [1]. Similarly, when the BRT system was augmented with a new ‘express’ type of bus that would not call at all stops, allowing for quicker longer-haul transfers within the city, the issue of allowing such buses not to be blocked by slower vehicles stationing at facing stops in narrow roads arose. Again, this could have easily called for all sorts of smart, digital ‘solutions’, such as geo-locating the vehicles, sensing their presence and mutual position, maybe automatically controlling their speed through actuators in their engines linked with the centrally managed system. What was done, however, was rather smart indeed, yet involving no high technology. Simply, opposed stops were moved slightly, so that they would be staggered and allow enough space for the express buses to go through even when two slower vehicles were loading passengers at both sides of the road. This points at two key hints that matter in smart – in its wider sense – space design. One is of course the importance of simplicity. The other one, however, is the often underplayed – if not entirely forgotten in contemporary digitally-driven urban visions – importance of physical space and the role and agency it has in the city.