5. the merging of sciences and other disciplines the combination of sectors to create new business the convergence of technology http://www.driversofchange.com/doc/
6.
7.
8. Information Technology is beginning to have a profound effect on the way the Built Environment is planned, designed, procured, constructed and operated .
47. things i wish i knew more about the future is already here, case studies… the new (?) business model for urban info too much information & public backlash?
A 30 minute intro to: design at Arup and the motivation for building data shadows. the opportunities for the democratization of design. the Internet of Things and current urban informatics projects at Arup
holistic approach to design incorporating continuous real-time feedback. Not a new idea, lots of people have been thinking about it for a long time – but technology is at a state where the tools to do this are making it much easier.
I work in a small foresight team - our main activity is our Drivers of Change programme which includes thematic thought pieces, workshops with clients to investigate the “the future of....” and our DoC publication which is shown in the image. The team is an eclectic mix of architects, engineers, physicists, economists, social scientists, computer scientists, art historian and curator..... Our remit is to support Arup businesses demonstrate their thought leadership.
My Context: – engineer, AI, heavily influenced by user centred design – web, product, service design – at arup joined R&D – set-up foresight activity Came across an old Arup news from month i was born - last sentence second paragraph... my role is to help make educated leaps of faith I am interested in the inevitability of technology development and in turn how information (transformed data) is re-shaping our built environment.
As part of my foresight activity I am working on the convergence research programme. Two ISSUES from that research on the theme of IoT help frame the context for my work.
self surveillance – the increasing trend to be able to monitor our daily activity and the communities forming around that monitoring - “if you give it a score it becomes a game” – hyper milers on forums competing on MPG
geoweb - the phenomenal increase in location based technologies – from UPS to FourSquare or in the example above taxis – the world around us is increasingly sensed.
In parallel to my small area of investigation there is a revolution occurring with IT in the built environment - Information Technology is beginning to have a profound effect on the way the Built Environment is planned, designed, procured, constructed and operated. [ Melbourne Rectangular Stadium (commercially known as AAMI Park)]
Multidisciplinary simulation In masterplanning a new city Realtime modelling can visualise multidisciplinary factors, such as daylight analysis and vehicular movement, in a single, navigable environment. 3D URBANISM, ECO CITY As our quest for low-carbon cities progresses, the tools we need to visualise and model their development become more complex. Virtual modelling plays a crucial role in understanding the interaction between components such as buildings, people, transport systems and natural environment. Promoting the adoption of an interactive, multi-parameter Realtime quantitative simulation, Arup is working to produce a sophisticated city masterplanning tool, to better inform planners, clients and designers of local conditions and impacts of proposed developments. Pedestrian and vehicular movement is modelled in relation to proposed land use, and noise assessments can be carried out, as well as analysis of daylight factors, to ensure the creation of a truly sustainable city.
Visualisation Trying to imagine what a new building may look like, from all angles, is a challenge greatly aided by visualisation, communicating designers’ plans to the clients and facilitating dialogue. FULTON STREET TRANSIT CENTER, NEW YORK, USA The challenge of creating a new $1.54 billion transit hub in Lower Manhattan with at least 300,000 passenger movements per day (between 14 separate subway lines), with improved accessibility, wayfinding, connectivity, efficiency and safety, required a daring and complex vision. This vision in turn required highly advanced visualisation to communicate with the client, multiple layers of stakeholders, designers and contractors, and train and station operators. What was needed and produced was a universal visualisation containing all information necessary to support the processes of every design team member. It harnessed the power of parametric modelling to define and represent complex geometry through fundamental characteristics and inherent element relationships.
Parametric relational modelling The ease of redesign and clash detection provided by parametric relational modelling, leads to the completion of projects ahead of schedule, at a higher quality and lower cost. KURILPA BRIDGE, BRISBANE, AUSTRALIA In celebration of its 150th birthday in 2009, the city of Brisbane announced the creation of a new city landmark, the Kurilpa Bridge. A link in pedestrian and cycle routes across the city the bridge is also a design showcase for Brisbane. Its complex geometrical structure, based on the principles of tensegrity (a synergy between balanced tension and compression components), required parametric relational modelling to bring this ambitious design to life. Visualisations of this modelling allowed pre-emptive clash checks and redesigns before production, ensuring a smooth construction on site, with completion due ahead of schedule.
3D GIS A 3D GIS model can visualise aspects of an infrastructure system or building design which are often unseen yet critical; for example, underground features which might pose obstacles to construction, avoiding error and time delays. KWUN TONG LINE EXTENSION PRELIMINARY DESIGN, HONG KONG Extending the Kwun Tong line, the first mass transit underground line in Hong Kong will pose a number of challenges for designers and contractors, as the proposed alignment runs through densely populated urban areas. A 3D GIS has been developed to show ground conditions along the alignment including boreholes, existing fill & rockhead surfaces, building foundations and adjacent MTR lines. The 3D model for the preliminary design displayed the underground geometry of the MTR tunnels and stations with existing layouts and conditions; allowing the interfaces of the various schemes to be easily understood and considered. Various ground related risks were visualised in this way, including the effects of the tunnel blasting on surrounding sensitive receivers such as nearby buildings, utilities as well as slopes and retaining walls.
city modelling A model of an entire city centre becomes a crucial decision-making tool for planners, authorities, developers and members of the public, particularly considering the added dimension of time, which permits long-term planning discussions. MANCHESTER CITY CENTRE, MANCHESTER, UK Following the bombing of Manchester’s city centre in 1996, Arup developed its first 3D/4D urban modelling system for the city. Having grown four times in size from initial work on particular areas such as Ancoats Urban Village, Arup has produced a 3D computer model of the entire inner Manchester area, which uses computer gaming technology to allow users to virtually move through the streets of the city centre. The wide range of simulation capabilities of the model allow it to be a key decision-making platform for planners, city authorities, developers and the public, demonstrating impacts of future developments and acting as a dynamic tool to monitor change in the city.
BIM Building information modelling attaches both parametric relational modelling and generative component data to a building’s design, facilitating information transfer between the design team and the client. ARTS AND SCIENCE MUSEUM, MARINA BAY SANDS INTEGRATED RESORT, SINGAPORE Comprising two levels of gallery and museum spaces (as well as one level of mechanical plant equipment) the Arts and Science Museum (ASM) forms part of the Marina Bay Sands Integrated Resort Project (MBIRS) currently under construction in Singapore. Arup provided a 3D model of the primary structural steelwork to allow co-ordination with architectural surfaces, setting out primary steelwork framing and passing information to the steelwork fabricator for preparation of detail shop drawings. Using this parametric relational modelling provided designers with flexibility, swift generation of sections and construction lines and a method of alteration to avoid potential errors in construction.
one of the key areas of development over the past few years internally at Arup has been in the exchange of information between applications - organizing the scripts and hacks to ease the manipulation of data between tools
Bringing it all together is an Arup tool - DesignLink
SO we have great experience in optimising our design processes but we also need to look at optimising the operation of buildings: model - as a company we are brilliant at modeling, simulating and predicting performance - it helps us to design at a macro and micro scale simulate - but as an industry it is arguable that we do enough to test our assumptions post occupancy - which becomes even more difficult when humans enter the loop.
But we can start to correlate the real with the modeled. One of my first experiences of data shadows was while working on the millennium bridge – heavily instrumented and monitored, switchable, controllable, sociable – but no performance feedback really designed into system. Once we had done our job we removed all the kit and the bridge stopped telling us stuff
data shadows – the traces of activities that become persistent in the physical world by the actions we take – (see Adam Greenfields Everyware)
One of the first commercial applications of this thinking is being driven by the sustainability agenda – regulation, cost saving, publicity urban informatics lets us unfold resource use – I have examples here working at different scales in different contexts - sustainability - make it personal - this started via comfort research using WSN’s - but current focus is on resource use
regulation, publicity, cost saving are also driving the desire to monitor public / commercial buildings and displays stats in real time eg this buildings resource use - aside – how to show meaningful data
regulation, publicity, cost saving are also driving the desire to monitor public / commercial buildings and displays stats in real time eg this buildings resource use - aside – how to show meaningful data
regulation, publicity, cost saving are also driving the desire to monitor public / commercial buildings and displays stats in real time eg this buildings resource use - aside – how to show meaningful data
community - floors are typically sublet - estate management team encouraging competition between business -in pipeline another developer is offering rent free months to encourage "best resource use behaviour" also worth note here is the difficulty in getting this stuff installed - the networked bms
but also some feeds are only ever at a building level - gas - maybe space and hot water but thats it...
and this collision of ubiquitous data, smart sensors, mobile computing means that real-time urban information is seeping quietly into our neighborhoods Why is this useful? if delivered in an appropriate form you can positively affect behaviour – this will mean different things to different stakeholders but enables: cities to be better managed, more resource efficient and maintain a high quality of life.
We are at a crux - people are listening now, soon we will have to start demonstrating the payback - First really comprehensive review of informatics at a city level with a client (vs looking at one area of the city such as transport) – report is a great summary of current best practice and references to external examples – if this stuff interests you this is a must read.
In addition we are also interested in more deliberate symbiotic relationships - Common issue we have faced on the instrumenting buildings projects is getting user engagement. YCT is about energy use in corporate offices and tools for landlords and SMEs in Business Incubators The aim is to use a web based platform inspired by social media tools to share information on building operation. Partners listed in slide - data feeds, soft landings, building operation
enable non-specialists to provide informed comments enable other discipline to understand and integrate design enable quantitative user testing
Realtime Wayfinding Admiralty allows the human factors specialist to run controlled tests with hundreds of real people in the virtual station. Qualitative people milling around the station are introduced to create context to the wayfinding test. The user sits in front of the monitors and controls the navigation intuitively with a joystick. The application spans three 30 inches monitors to allow for accurate signage legibility (FOV) without losing the ability to detect wayfinding clues in the peripheral views. The environment uses collision meshes and auto camera balancer (ACB) to support smooth navigation. A Wayfinding Utility was created to enable the human factor specialist to video capture and playback every journey by the users, it also enabled the logging of the journeys for future false-colour maps representation and analysis to quickly identify for example recurrent point of user hesitation. Finally, it enabled the human factor specialist to introduce a “starting position” and a “treasure position” to time and compare user journeys.
Michelle was asked to find South Island Line from Entrance C. You see in the video that from Entrance C there is no sign indicating South Island Line, she therefore wonders forward and lokks around 360mdegrees one first time, still no indication, then she moves further forward towards the center of the station and 360 degrees lookaround, still no luck. The recording eventually ends, however 6:30min later Michelle eventually arrives at the South Island Platform. You notice jerkiness of joystick, you notice that michelle gets stuck into people that have collision meshes activated, however the gist is there, the signage failed her. And signage layout is by professional, and what you see is version 09 of the signage design
crowdsourcing qualitative feedback? is there a role for user contribution / testing of our designs?
Observation – I am curious about how we can think about data as a material that can be used in the built environment. and how when that data becomes socialised we define the processes around how people interact in space. IoT as the tech that supports the creation of data shadows
for example – this UK startup has created a brilliant service to share data Their primary observation was the idea that data is really a craft, that the point is not just 'making data public' but the 'public making data' (because that's how you really begin to learn about and engage with your environment and neighbours) and that participative sensing gives people the tools to question standards of evidence.
for example within days of the Fukishima Nuclear Disaster in Japan – geiger counters all over Japan started to “share” data via pachube – this community effort created a really simple way for people to share information at minimal cost.
So what will be the impact of these data shadows? This is my hometown of Middlesbrough. this is where I learnt to windsurf In the industrial era output / production was a very visible process. Artifacts, smoke stacks. But so much activity today takes place behind a screen – the following is some examples of data we are trying to reveal
PhD research - understanding the sense of community – resident and transient, understanding flow – inspired by collective intelligence on the internet - hinteraction:hintsights
green screens are popping up everyware - this one is from some hackers in our melbourne office
BUT who looks at these screens - experimenting at point of use - hintsights - simple infographics – exploring how they can be used to supplement an information layer in the built environment
State Library of Queensland - screen based workers are often very anonymous – is he a student, a gamer, talking to family overseas, a programmer, a writer, or a business man presenting to a remote client? 24/7 jane jacobs eyes on the street
but also making explicit what is largely an invisible process of knowledge work – providing context around a space - tag cloud of internet connections within public wi-fi space
but I want to come back to the physical internet of things - a plant that tweets so how will the city evolve when IPv6 starts to deliver ubiquitous talking plants that schedule their own maintenance routines and optimise their resources usage – will we design ourselves and our watering cans into this system? ie ITOBO HSG Zander Botanicals – tweets when its thirsty - http://www.flickr.com/photos/blackbeltjones/
If you need proof this is possible here is the “hello world” of urban informatics- 3638 followers April 2011 and look at who it follows – how many of your projects do you have an ongoing conversation with?
I don’t want to end on a slide about twitter. The EU is funding 100’s millions of Euros into “future internet” research. The infrastructure to do many of things I have talked about is only partially there. Many of the live systems you see are built on hacks. (e.g. page scraping to feed twitter, tfl live tube data servers falling over) Sensei - project we outlined the 9 design goals above for an architecture that would support networks of WSNs and business models have been analysed to understand who would pay for the infrastructure. We are attacking on two fronts – strategic planning and delivering concepts http://www.ict-sensei.org / resources and resource end points - each real world entity (sensor / actuator) has node and gateway type status context info - framework to describe how resources can be described allows machine reading at different levels support services - SQR - you could access a known sensor but it is more likely that you will want to access a sensor of x in a location y over a time period of z - you may not know a priori if that data is available.
things i am thinking about at the moment in the context of the energy monitoring work, the smart city strategies, engaging with clients and informing our business about the “internet of things” [Manchester City model]
technology to support behaviour changea longitudinal evidence based approach is needed