Why Tech Moguls Are Obsessed with Building Utopian Cities • Hacker News Board

Re: Why Tech Moguls Are Obsessed with Building Utopian Cities

#51

Post by thomasedwards » Mon, Feb 22, 2021, 4:47 PM UTC

vzidex wrote: post #44

niklasd wrote: post #22

Hamburg build from 2008 on a new district, the HafenCity, a soulless place of concrete, expensive apartments, and chain stores. I recently thought about how great it would have been to try something radical new – like building everything with wood, fantastic public transport, and as little cars as possible. My conclusion was that the only way that realistically could have happend was with subsidies from a billionaire…

> Hamburg build from 2008 on a new district, the HafenCity, a soulless place of concrete, expensive apartments, and chain stores. I find your description here fascinating, because it's exactly how I've described the CityPlace district [1] here in Toronto that was built over the last 20 years, with most development in the last 10. Makes me wonder how common this style of modern, sterile, "ideal" development is in big…

Really feel like they could have tried about 5% harder with the name. At least the brand doesn’t have to be soulless even if the place is.

Re: Why Tech Moguls Are Obsessed with Building Utopian Cities

#52

Post by atlasunshrugged » Mon, Feb 22, 2021, 4:48 PM UTC

chadlavi wrote: post #35

atlasunshrugged wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Really? I'm sorry to hear it's the same in the UK but I loved Berlin and Tallinn wasn't bad (most of what was bad was out of their control ie the weather). I've lived in SF, San Diego, northern Nevada, DC, Berlin, Tallinn, London (Enfield) and Yerevan and by far European cities were much better run in my opinion

This is a vast oversimplification on my part, but I suspect what you observed was because the European cities are run by governments that are more inclined to serve the needs of citizens, and US cities are run by governments that are more inclined to serve business interests.

Generally I agree, although I think there's also some weird other effects going on - I don't think it's in any businesses interest that there are tons of homeless people or drug addicts in SF or pushing prosecutors not to get them off the streets for instance. But yes, as a longtime Nevada resident who saw the harm casinos did to local populations, I can definitely say that cities often do what makes the most tax revenue if the costs are diffused enough (or not politically important)

Re: Why Tech Moguls Are Obsessed with Building Utopian Cities

#53

Post by echoradio » Mon, Feb 22, 2021, 4:51 PM UTC

tempsy wrote: post #30

Is this really a new concept? Disney built a town Celebration, Florida near Disneyworld which has a pop of 7500 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celebration,_Florida

Celebration is not anything close the utopian city dreamed of by Walt Disney. EPCOT was still in blue sky planning stages when he died.

It’s a pity we never saw what was possible. The land for Walt Disney World has its own government and possibly could have developed the concept without public interference.

Disney (the company) commandeered the idea of EPCOT concept thinking it would be a nostalgic nod to the founder and created a theme park and real estate development which barely, if at all, reflected Disney’s (the person) vision.

Meanwhile, Celebration kind of turned into a dystopian situation.[1]

[1] https://www.thedailybeast.com/celebration-florida-how-disney...

Re: Why Tech Moguls Are Obsessed with Building Utopian Cities

#54

Post by iamatworknow » Mon, Feb 22, 2021, 4:53 PM UTC

thomasedwards wrote: post #51

vzidex wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Hamburg build from 2008 on a new district, the HafenCity, a soulless place of concrete, expensive apartments, and chain stores. I find your description here fascinating, because it's exactly how I've described the CityPlace district [1] here in Toronto that was built over the last 20 years, with most development in the last 10. Makes me wonder how common this style of modern, sterile, "ideal" development is in big…

Really feel like they could have tried about 5% harder with the name. At least the brand doesn’t have to be soulless even if the place is.

Interestingly, Long Island City in New York has become the same sort of concrete soulless high rise area, with an equally uninteresting name.

https://ny.curbed.com/2016/8/31/12732412/long-island-city-de...

Re: Why Tech Moguls Are Obsessed with Building Utopian Cities

#55

Post by fennecfoxen » Mon, Feb 22, 2021, 4:55 PM UTC

thatguy0900 wrote: post #3

What a strange thing to pin on tech. Company towns have existed forever, to the point of having laws made about how they can function. Walt Disney and ford also wanted to create a utopia city. I think this is more of a rich man's hobby than anything related to tech moguls at all. Hell, some even establish their own currency https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Company_scrip#Coal_company_s...

Utopian designs are not just for tech moguls, they're for anyone powerful who wants to reshape society from the top down. But we don't have as many dictators these days, and tech is the hot sector where the money and influence is found.

Re: Why Tech Moguls Are Obsessed with Building Utopian Cities

#56

Post by ardy42 » Mon, Feb 22, 2021, 4:56 PM UTC

thatguy0900 wrote: post #3

What a strange thing to pin on tech. Company towns have existed forever, to the point of having laws made about how they can function. Walt Disney and ford also wanted to create a utopia city. I think this is more of a rich man's hobby than anything related to tech moguls at all. Hell, some even establish their own currency https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Company_scrip#Coal_company_s...

> What a strange thing to pin on tech. Company towns have existed forever, to the point of having laws made about how they can function.

The idea of building a utopian city doesn't need to be a brand new thing for tech moguls to have a greater interest in creating them than other types of contemporary moguls.

Also, I don't think a company town is really the same thing as a utopian city. In my mind a "company town" is mainly an attempt to maximize exploitation of a set of workers, while a "utopian city" is built as a pure expression of some subset of someone's ideals, relatively unsullied by competing ideas, which usually aren't so crass as "maximal exploitation of the residents."

Re: Why Tech Moguls Are Obsessed with Building Utopian Cities

#57

Post by jacobajit » Mon, Feb 22, 2021, 5:00 PM UTC

vzidex wrote: post #44

niklasd wrote: post #22

Hamburg build from 2008 on a new district, the HafenCity, a soulless place of concrete, expensive apartments, and chain stores. I recently thought about how great it would have been to try something radical new – like building everything with wood, fantastic public transport, and as little cars as possible. My conclusion was that the only way that realistically could have happend was with subsidies from a billionaire…

> Hamburg build from 2008 on a new district, the HafenCity, a soulless place of concrete, expensive apartments, and chain stores. I find your description here fascinating, because it's exactly how I've described the CityPlace district [1] here in Toronto that was built over the last 20 years, with most development in the last 10. Makes me wonder how common this style of modern, sterile, "ideal" development is in big…

Hudson Yards in NYC is probably the most notorious example of this trend. Seems to be emblematic of a shift toward real estate as a luxury commodity investment, combined with massive developers having free rein to set up inorganic star mega-blocks. All this in close cooperation with cities that have an incentive to improve what were once brownfield sites and are now the most valuable undeveloped sites into tax behemoths.

See also: Seaport in Boston, Navy Yard in DC, Mission Bay in San Francisco

Re: Why Tech Moguls Are Obsessed with Building Utopian Cities

#58

Post by pas » Mon, Feb 22, 2021, 5:01 PM UTC

niklasd wrote: post #22

Hamburg build from 2008 on a new district, the HafenCity, a soulless place of concrete, expensive apartments, and chain stores. I recently thought about how great it would have been to try something radical new – like building everything with wood, fantastic public transport, and as little cars as possible. My conclusion was that the only way that realistically could have happend was with subsidies from a billionaire…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L4QYkEpw9pA "This new district of Helsinki is being made almost entirely from timber [...]"

Re: Why Tech Moguls Are Obsessed with Building Utopian Cities

#59

Post by jellicle » Mon, Feb 22, 2021, 5:03 PM UTC

Tech utopia as drawn by illustrators imagining what tech overlords might want: Jetsons, flying cars, Disney Tomorrowland

Tech utopia as drawn by actual tech overlords when they actually get to build their dreams: Rio de Janeiro favela slums inhabited by as many expendable gig workers as can be crammed in living under 24/7 oppressive police presence and ultrasurveillance, plus also a separate, fully gated and guarded community for the rich people to live in and high opaque walls so that group 2 doesn't have to see group 1 or think about them

Re: Why Tech Moguls Are Obsessed with Building Utopian Cities

#60

Post by aww_dang » Mon, Feb 22, 2021, 5:03 PM UTC

lotsofpulp wrote: post #42

ashtonkem wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a general matter, I think Utopianism is a bad idea, and I don’t think we should be sinking huge amounts of resources into giant leaps like this. I’d rather see incremental tweaks in the right direction first, as I think those are far more effective at bringing lasting change. Fundamentally, we’re really bad at predicting the future. Utopian projects involve making big bets on what the future might hold, which make…

Accommodating cars is the most important variable in all places I see. Once you design for accommodating cars, everything is so spread out that it precludes a non-car oriented life. So while you can make commercial streets pedestrian, you can’t change the fundamental fact that everything is too far from everything else to have the necessary foot traffic to sustain businesses. Not to mention the political challenges t…

Maybe people like their cars and choose to live in places that accommodate them?

Personally, I am something of a bicycle extremist and have always found a way to navigate urban/suburban areas. It is something that comes with practice. Eventually you learn how to navigate these areas you felt were impassable. With practice you develop instincts for approaching new areas.

I know it will be a bit unpopular at HN, but I think you need to be something of a self-starter and willing to take the plunge. I've been on planned bike lanes that felt less safe than just riding on the street with traffic. They can create the wrong expectations for both motorists and cyclists.

Naturally you would encounter political problems in developing a "car-free" city, if your prospective residents want to use their cars. Especially if you are left using political leverage to impose your ideals upon the residents.

If people truly loved cycling more than the convenience of automobiles, wouldn't they develop the similar techniques for navigating urban and suburban areas?

That isn't to say that more can't be done to accommodate cyclists and pedestrians, but I disagree with your absolutist analysis.