Mobile Telephones And Urban Metabolism

While in the past five years the Internet and World Wide Web have received a great deal of attention from the media and scholars alike, other telecommunications technologies have rapidly diffused in this period as well. Mobile telephones have been rapidly accepted throughout the urban world, particularly in countries with far lower levels of Internet use. While mobile telephones are sold as a technology that helps conquer constraints of location and geography, it is increasingly apparent that the time-management capabilities of this new tool are equally important. As a result, the widespread use of these devices is quickening of the pace of urban life and at an aggregate level, resulting in a dramatic increase in the metabolism of urban systems. This quickening metabolism is directly tied to the widespread formation of new decentralized information networks facilitated by this new technology. As a result, new paradigms for understanding the city and city planning in a decentralized context are discussed. "Mobile communications devices will have a profound effect on our cities as they are woven into the daily routines of urban inhabitants. Urban planners and architects have only addressed these new technologies on a cosmetic level, such as the design and placement of the increasing number of antenna towers needed to support the growth in network usage. They have barely begun thinking about the larger impacts of these technologies."

Thanks to Dwight Mercer