City Science Initiative (CSI): Urban Systems for a Post-Oil, Connected World

The world is experiencing a period of extreme urbanization. In China alone, 300 million rural inhabitants will move to urban areas over the next 15 years. This will require building an infrastructure equivalent to the one housing the entire population of the United States in a matter of a few decades.

In the future, cities will account for nearly 90% of global population growth, 80% of wealth creation, and 60% of total energy consumption. Developing better strategies for the creation of new cities, is therefore, a global imperative.

The need to improve our understanding of cities, however, is pressed not only by the social relevance of urban environments, but also by the failure of traditional approaches. Current understanding of cities is based on either the tradition of architecture and urban planning, where scientific knowledge has played little to no role, or that of the social sciences, where the built environment is considered at best, of secondary importance. To build the cities that the world needs we need a scientific understanding of cities that takes the built environment into consideration. Future cities desperately need such understanding.

The City Science Initiative is a unique network of research groups experienced in the design of technology and infrastructure, analysis of big data, and the development of rigorous scientific theories. The City Science Initiative at the MIT Media Lab provides the nexus where these research networks join to improve the design, livability and understanding of what makes a high performance urban environment.

The Initiative is eeking strategic partners from industry and government to develop targeted research projects and living lab deployments around the themes of urban design, mobility-on-demand, energy, big data, responsive technologies, and integrated live-work environments.

The mission is to develop urban strategies that can result in:
(*) 100x -- Reduction in CO2 emissions
(*) 10x -- Reduction in traffic congestion
(*) 5x -- Improvement in livability
(*) 2x -- Improvement in creativity

Building on current work at the MIT Media Lab, City Science researchers will initially focus on the following project themes. Additional project themes will be added in response to the priorities of corporate members, MIT researchers, and the City Science advisory board. These six initial themes represent a cross section of the interdisciplinary research that will be undertaken to address the major challenges associated with global urbanization.

Urban Analysis and Modeling -- Projects in this theme will focus on data-driven analyses of economic activity, human behavior, mobility patterns, and resource consumption to inform a process for designing new cities. Parametric urban design tools and computer simulation will enable the creation of schematically defined mobility nodes, street typologies, building massing, and resource allocation. These parametrically defined urban elements will be used to develop processes for rapid prototyping of cities, creating a powerful toolkit for developers and planners to understand the constraints of energy, mobility, water, food, and waste in post-oil cities. Typologies of streetscapes, pathways, mobility hubs, and architectural solutions for urban bottlenecks can be developed based on real-time data collection. Targeted interventions for existing cities and phasing strategies for the development of new cities will be generated in an evidence-based fashion, influenced by the findings of living laboratory experiments.

Projects include:
(*) Data-driven analysis of economic activity, human behavior, mobility patterns, resource consumption, etc. in order to inform an evidence-based process of designing new cities
(*) Data-driven, parametric urban design tools to schematically define mobility nodes, streets, building massing, and location of resources to create nested compact urban cells (walkable neighborhoods)
(*) Urban energy, mobility, water, food, and waste simulator for new, post-oil cities
(*) Typology of streetscapes, pathways, mobility nodes, and responsive technology for cities Incentives and Governance

Incentives and Governance -- In most cities, urban services are poorly distributed and require significant human capital to maintain and upkeep. Projects in this theme will address the creation of new, network-centric methods for managing reactive urban systems. This includes the prototyping of persuasive interfaces that provide dynamic incentives for rebalancing of shared-use systems, and replacing the traditional one-size-fits-all urban service strategy with flexible options. These new models will be influenced by crowd-sourced intelligence and respond in real-time to the needs of urban residents. Urban-scale serious games can provide targeted incentives for city dwellers to alter their consumption patterns and shape use of resources such as shared-used mobility, variable-rate electricity, and flexible/time-shared workspaces. New portals for information dissemination through mobile applications and web-based interfaces will improve transparency in governance and accessibility of information.

Projects include:
(*) New network-centric methods for managing these new reactive, data-driven city systems
(*) Replace “one-size-fits-all” systems with exchange networks in order to obtain more stable, fair, and socially efficient services
(*) Dynamic incentives for re-balancing shared-use and interacting systems
(*) Urban-scale “serious games” to shape use of resources such as shared-used mobility, variable-rate power, and flexible workspaces

Mobility Networks -- Modern trip planners have dramatically improved the multimodal transit experience for millions of urban commuters, but they are often limited to a select few modes such as driving, walking, and public transit. Projects in this theme include the development of a sophisticated multi-modal mobility recommendation engine that ties together a variety of modes, from carpooling to bike sharing, and is influenced by real-time data such as weather patterns, traffic, and past user behavior. New urban vehicles including electric scooters, cars, and compact bike-lane vehicles are being designed and prototyped at the MIT Media Lab. Existing vehicle prototypes and vehicle-pedestrian interfaces for autonomous cars can offer a powerful platform for user-centric autonomous vehicle research. Improved public infrastructure for shared electric vehicles such as integrated charging and locking technology will reduce vehicle rental/dropoff time and dramatically improve user experience. Similarly, persuasive interfaces for shared-use vehicle systems can encourage mode-shift and positive mobility patterns for health.

Projects include:
(*)Multi-modal mobility recommendation engines
(*) New urban vehicles including electric scooters, automobiles, bike-lane vehicles, etc.
(*) Autonomous vehicle technology and vehicle-pedestrian interfaces
(*) Charging and locking technology for shared-use vehicle systems
(*) Interfaces for shared-use vehicle systems, including proactive, persuasive systems

Places of Living and Work -- The nature of work is changing dramatically with the ubiquity of mobile devices and Internet connectivity. The traditional office building is rapidly becoming obsolete as a place for personal work. Boundaries between home and the workplace are dissolving rapidly, spurred by advanced computation and syncronous and asyncronous communication. The design and prototyping of personalized, transformable urban housing will enable city dwellers to maximize the functionality of a small apartment, thereby improving livability and convenience. Timeshifted, shared space-on-demand for collaborative work will allow for face to face meetings while giving businesses the opportunity to reduce their office space requirements and reduce net energy consumption. The integration of modular, personalized hydroponic and aeroponic urban farming systems will give urban residents the opportunity to grow their own food and improve transparency of our incredibly complex food supply chain.

Projects include:
(*) Personalized, transformable urban housing
(*) Time-shifted, shared “space-on-demand” for collaborative work
(*) Modular, personalized hydroponic and aeroponic urban farming
(*) Sensing and algorithms to understand fine-grained human activity for responsive lighting, HVAC, health, energy conservation, and communication in the home and workplace

Electronic and Social Networks -- Social networks enable the instant proliferation of ideas and events. Some have even contributed to sociopolitical movement and revolutions. Projects in this theme will explore electronic nervous systems, from the scale of the human body to the city. These decentralized electronic and social networks can form the basis for new patterns of learning, recreation, production, and health. They can provide pathways for people to communicate with their private and public worlds. The reach its full potential, an interlinked system of trust networks, that provide security through data encryption and biometric technologies, must be developed. These trust networks ensure privacy for otherwise invasive systems that make use of highly personal data such as mobility patterns, resource consumption (food, water, energy), and individualized health profiles.

Projects include:
(*) Electronic nervous systems, from the scale of the human body to the city (*) Decentralized, contextualized, and social forms of communication to transform patterns of learning, recreation, production, and health
(*) Trust networks to provide security and insure privacy for otherwise invasive systems that make use of person activity data

Energy Networks -- New technologies for smart grids and intelligent metering can enable urban energy networks that dynamically respond to human mobility and behavior patterns. Today, networked demand response systems can reduce peak loading on our aging electric grids but the integration of renewable energy sources is still difficult due to intermittency. Project in this theme will focus on the exploration of DC microgrids for compact urban cells that incorporate localized renewable energy generation sources such as rooftop solar and microturbines. These local DC power networks can reduce AC/DC conversion losses in residential buildings and provide direct connections to photovoltaic energy and battery-based energy storage. New technologies for energy storage will be investigated in depth, including business and service models for repurposing second-life automobile batteries for grid energy storage and buffering rapid charging of electric vehicles.

Projects include:
(*) Dynamic “smart grids” that respond to human mobility and behavior patterns
(*) Electric (DC) microgrids for compact urban cells and renewable energy
(*) Second-life of auto batteries for energy buffer and vehicle charging
(*) DC power networks for residential buildings