Urban Operating Systems

Producing the Computational City

Ebook
On sale Dec 15, 2020 | 296 Pages | 9780262360999

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An exploration of the modest potentials and serious contradictions of reconfiguring urban life through computational operating systems.

A new wave of enthusiasm for smart cities, urban data, and the Internet of Things has created the impression that computation can solve almost any urban problem. Subjecting this claim to critical scrutiny, in this book, Andrés Luque-Ayala and Simon Marvin examine the cultural, historical, and contemporary contexts in which urban computational logics have emerged. They consider the rationalities and techniques that constitute emerging computational forms of urbanization, including work on digital urbanism, smart cities, and, more recently, platform urbanism. They explore the modest potentials and serious contradictions of reconfiguring urban life, city services, and urban-networked infrastructure through computational operating systems.
Acknowledgments vii
Chapter Credits xi
1 Introduction: Producing the Computational City 1
2 Operationalization: Diagramming the City through the Urban OS 27
3 Datafication: The Making of Data-as-Infrastructure 55
4 Sensing: Commodification through Hyperfragmentation 81
5 Mapping: The Computational Production of Territory 105 with Flávia Neves Maia
6 Prediction: The City as a Calculative Machine 129
7 Circulation: Maintaining Urban Flows under Turbulence 149
8 Resistance? Civic Hacking and an Operating System for Urban Occupation 177
9 Conclusion: The Urban OS as a Political Technology 209
Notes 225
References 237
Index 271
Andrés Luque-Ayala is Associate Professor in the Department of Geography at Durham University, UK. Simon Marvin is Director of The Urban Institute at the University of Sheffield, UK.

About

An exploration of the modest potentials and serious contradictions of reconfiguring urban life through computational operating systems.

A new wave of enthusiasm for smart cities, urban data, and the Internet of Things has created the impression that computation can solve almost any urban problem. Subjecting this claim to critical scrutiny, in this book, Andrés Luque-Ayala and Simon Marvin examine the cultural, historical, and contemporary contexts in which urban computational logics have emerged. They consider the rationalities and techniques that constitute emerging computational forms of urbanization, including work on digital urbanism, smart cities, and, more recently, platform urbanism. They explore the modest potentials and serious contradictions of reconfiguring urban life, city services, and urban-networked infrastructure through computational operating systems.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments vii
Chapter Credits xi
1 Introduction: Producing the Computational City 1
2 Operationalization: Diagramming the City through the Urban OS 27
3 Datafication: The Making of Data-as-Infrastructure 55
4 Sensing: Commodification through Hyperfragmentation 81
5 Mapping: The Computational Production of Territory 105 with Flávia Neves Maia
6 Prediction: The City as a Calculative Machine 129
7 Circulation: Maintaining Urban Flows under Turbulence 149
8 Resistance? Civic Hacking and an Operating System for Urban Occupation 177
9 Conclusion: The Urban OS as a Political Technology 209
Notes 225
References 237
Index 271

Author

Andrés Luque-Ayala is Associate Professor in the Department of Geography at Durham University, UK. Simon Marvin is Director of The Urban Institute at the University of Sheffield, UK.

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