The greatness of any city can be measured on the basis of how well the tangible infrastructure of its built environment supports the social dynamics of its inhabitants. When these material and social networks are in close alignment, as is the case in the best of cities, healthy and vibrant relationships spread from the streets to neighborhoods to the city as a whole – a process that is sustained by the inspiration of those who witness it unfold.

While it is easy to spot many of the ways in which social interactions are related to the physical contexts in which they take place, these dynamics are becoming increasingly difficult to observe as people continue to adopt communication media that leave little if any tangible trace. The use of cell phones, for example, has radically redefined our notions of public space. It has changed the ways in which the built environment and social networks are aligned, and it has done this in a manner that leaves people little feedback with which to orient themselves.

We strongly believe in the value of new technology and the promise of change. New possibilities will emerge from the deployment of such technology. But we also understand the importance of enabling people to see how their environments are changing as they are changing. Without such feedback, people's ability to envision new possibilities of interaction in and with their surroundings is severely compromised. And as we know from experience, the health of cities and the publics who inhabit them is premised upon such personal involvement.

Interception & Feedback
Electronic communication pervades Battery Park City. The atmosphere is dense with bit-streams that flow and eddy in a manner that has no regard for the floors and walls that define space. These dynamics are almost beyond the range of human perception. Without the cables and wires of the last century, people have little more than strategically located transmitters and relays to map the patterns of their electronic exchange. The immateriality of this information negates the spatial dimensions of communication.

Our proposal addresses this situation by transforming electronic information into a tangible substance. We will illuminate the dynamics of communication in the same way that an accumulation of discarded newspaper caught in a chain-link fence reveals the wind. It is not the news that is of interest, but rather the higher-order information on local forces and topographies that is manifest in how and where the paper collects. By drawing attention to ways that environmental factors impact flows of information in real-time, we will provide people with a valuable source of feedback on how their personal exchanges are related to larger patterns of communication.

The Prototype
Using simple and affordable technology, we will deploy a networked grid of sensors that register local electronic communication activity with beacons. Embedded in sidewalks, building facades, and other elements of the urban fabric, these sensors will momentarily illuminate as people using wireless devices pass by, creating trails that are tangible to the user as well as others in the vicinity. While such feedback may be entertaining or even inspiring on an individual level, it will begin to create an ambiance when seen in aggregate – an ambiance that will reflect the ways that communication varies by location, time of day, and a host of other variables. In effect, these sensors will begin to register how and where social networks align with the built environment.

But the sensors will do more than just illuminate communication in its physical context. Because the sensors will be networked, they will highlight the dynamics of Battery Park City as a neighborhood in transition. And it is on the basis of this composite feedback that new ways of delivering information, goods, and services will emerge. In addition to providing a means of directing emergency resources to where they are most needed, such feedback could be used to manage other resources more efficiently. It is not difficult to imagine, for example, how the feedback could be used to facilitate “on demand” access to a broad range of information – whether in the form of mobile WiFi units, temporary projections on extant structures, or any of a host of other dynamic interfaces. By responding to the ways that hourly, daily, and seasonal factors shift the locations where people communicate, such a fluid infrastructure could provide an energy-efficient means of directly addressing a wide variety of everyday informational needs.

There are much better reasons, however, to illuminate the ways that electronic information flows across Battery Park City than those we can now imagine. And this is precisely the point. There is no possible way to plan for all of the many creative ways that such feedback will be put to use. By giving people a means to envision new relationships between their environment and the ways that they communicate, we will be providing the insight upon which innovation is premised and from which truly vital neighborhoods emerge.