Future Cities

This video discusses how cities may change in the face of uncertain future food, energy and water supplies. It is presented by Christopher Barnatt, Associate Professor of Computing & Future Studies in Notingham University Business School, and the author of www.explainingthefuture.com.

[@artmcteagle]

A short but very prescient video. The challenges he presented are still with us, increasingly. Sea level rise is also a looming threat to coastal cities. Prof. Barnatt is a polymath and we should heed his wisdom.

[@ExplainingTheFuture]

You are very kind.

[@danielkoepf1977]

Today you can work online, shop online, get online entertainment. In the future, the internet will have even stronger influence. For a lot of people it will become unnecessary to squeeze into an overcrowded city. In the future you can live in the countryside in a small town and still have all the amenities you are looking for.

[@georgevajagich2744]

***** so true

[@jnickence]

The thing about cities, is that 100+ years ago, citizens were still raising their own gardens, and keeping their own livestock in the yards behind their homes. It wouldn't be much of a stretch to go back to that.

[@lunayasha]

This is amazing, not only are you producing food, recycle water, but your also creating jobs and cleaner energy amazing!

[@orangeflame568]

When I think vertical farming. I think a room with carefully controlled air and water circulation, filled with layers of plants and red and blue lights. The room looks pink thanks to the lighting. You would never know it is a farm from the outside. Looks like any other concrete building.

[@ExplainingComputers]

This technology is already being tested. Fairly obviously it does not create power from nowhere. But, say, install it on the approaches to junctions and it can harvest some of the energy "lost" as vehicles brake (ie energy gets transferred to the hydraulic capture system as the car slows, rather than heating its breaking pads so much).

[@ramamohanrao24051941]

Prof. Christopher Barnatt , I am really delighted to see your pioneering work about future cities and living and I hope many will join you in their efforts in finding solutions for the impending and imminent realities we are destined to face . Being an architect I realize what sort of responsibilities architects have . Ramamohan Nori , Architect

[@georgewu5]

One of the solutions is to build the city on top of the traffic, covering up the noise and fume, walking downstairs to take the train or bus to go to work. No more car- loans, no more high interest rated mortgages because the affordable housing is built by a good government who really cares about the well being of it's people.The materials I have been using are the precast concrete double tees spanning 60'-0",or the $2,000 for one 40'-0" container ! George Wu, AIA 2012-5-13

[@thelittlestmig3394]

Today everything can be manufactured if you have enough resources available. Financial, political, demand and physical things like raw materials and energy. Every imaginable plant can be grown and every imaginable product could be produced locally today. Importing stuff is cheaper now but once oil prices rise and global trade via sea diminishes it becomes profitable. Agricultural and industrial capacity is there, waiting for right moment.

[@brianmerritt5410]

I want to see this in my lifetime.

[@ramyihtzhak]

stay alive!

[@DonaldKronos]

We need to be careful how we frame phrases like "generate power". Keep in mind that a road which used vehicles driving over them as a source of power would of course be "taking power" rather than "generating" it. The reduced vehicle efficiency could not possibly be worth the return since there would be no net gain and almost certainly a new loss of power in the process. However, I am thankful to see such things being discussed. It's much better than arguing over which God will save humanity.

[@MasterExploder61]

We're living in an environmentally conscious world now. We need to conserve as much land as possible because the bigger we stretch, the more pollution we generate, and we sacrifice more flora that contribute to the world's oxygen.

[@eclipseslayer98]

What we need is a person that is given complete control over all of the earth's nations and is wholly incorruptible so that person can turn our civilization around, and then in 50 years or how ever long it takes the world is eventually converted into a full democracy with no less than 3 nations per continent excluding Australia and Antarctica. This person also needs to know many subjects and has experience in dealing with situations and can act on them accordingly and not be overly aggressive.

[@AlexinWonderland1313]

his video might be about future but his intro is stuck way back in the past lol

[@jakemajor4805]

XD

[@MicrobyteAlan]

Great seeing you here.

[@jordanlewa9174]

I like that Vertical Farming idea. I think people like that eerie guy (in the video) better really plan seriously on building such architecture.

[@MichaelNTL]

I don't know, except this is the first video i have ever seen on youtube where captions actually work.

[@ExplainingTheFuture]

Hi George. Vertical farms would use either hydroponics or aeroponics to grow crops with no soil. The former is a highly established technique. The latter is very new, and sprays a mist of water and nutrients onto the roots of plants. Water savings can be up to 95 per cent.

[@SuperDopeboy44]

my friend and i were discussing this and because he wants to be an archetict and i want to be an engineer we made an entire city like this it was perfect

[@Christine.corneille]

some kinfd of International Chart of the Well being in the future will be welcome for each citizens

[@ExplainingTheFuture]

There is a massive differerence between having a machine that can purify water, and being able to do this cost-effectively in quantity to clean water for agricultral and industrial purposes. And you still need the water in the first place -- and transporting water long distances is rarely practical. The world will not run out of water, but many localities will reach Peak Water by around 2025.

[@Foundation111]

the manpower costs those city farms would need are huge.. fresh vegetables are already becoming a luxury in some parts of the world.. there are many good farming lands around the world that are not used to their potential...

[@chinookskier]

Everybody needs to do their part. It's good to consume as little as possible and try not to leave much of a foot print. I figure that I'll soon spend most of my time in the Canadian Rockies if I'm so blessed as to be able to retire in seven years. None of that city stuff for me if I have a choice.

[@ExplainingTheFuture]

Ah, but what you are missing is the increased yields per acre that could be gained from sealed hydroponic or aeroponic agriculture. According to Dickson Despommier (the real expert in this area), this can increase yields per acre by about 30 times. Also, above you are not accounting for the cost of transportation, food loss in storage and transit (c.10%), etc. Add these in, esp. with a 5-10x increase in oil prices, and things become more economic . . .

[@pundalikgajbhiye4074]

Nice to watch our future cities.

[@danielwarburton671]

I actually live in this city (Nottingham) and its getting pretty modern rather quickly

[@JonBiddell]

In the face of it, certainly an interesting concept.

[@georgewu5]

1/If the plant growing tower can produce food for 50,000 people. Fine.But transporting the food to the consumers needs trucks to ditribute,not as convenient as the farm is next door to the apartment on the same floor as I have planned. Therefore, each dweller would have a farm on his floor. 2/The space over the roadways have been vacant since the day the roads and railroads were built. Now build the housing over them so the fume,vibration and the noise will be cover over.George Wu, AIA 2012-6-10

[@trinityxavier5790]

that would be cool to see some of these come to life!

[@ExplainingTheFuture]

Some vertical farms are now being built in new "Smartcities" in China. Also, a former meet packing factory is currently beiing converted into a vertical farm called "The Plant" in Chicago. There are also plans for a vertical farm in Manchester, UK.

[@callisto8413]

I like the idea of breaking the link of food with fuel.

[@ExplainingTheFuture]

Vertical farms would almost certainly use hydroponics or aeroponics (where water nutrients are sprayed onto the roots of plants) and no soil. Almost certainly new crop strains would need to be developed, possibly via GM or synthetic biology.

[@ExplainingTheFuture]

@Excelsoft Thanks for your positive feedback.The city shots were filmed in Nottingham.

[@feynstein1004]

We'll also need to reshape cities because most people seem to dislike living in cities and would prefer to live in suburbs or rural communities instead.

[@randomizerman]

What makes you think that you need a whole story to grow plants? You can fit 5 or more plants per story. So a 1 acre times 100 stories times 5 plant racks per story would be the same as 500 acres. Also a city block is about 2.50 acres. So 2.5x100x5=1250 acres worth of growth, 2 main challenges are how do we run the lights, and small harvesters that can pollinate as well. Also I hope we stop wasting so much heat and space by putting ET3 and lev. trains inside of buildings and have just one.

[@danielmorrisonrhymes]

@RHawkeyed The cars don't burn more fuel, the plates just use the energy the car expends on the roads when they drive over. I don't think if you installed all the roads with these it would generate energy to make it worthwhile, but it could be interesting to install in a busy intersection as a one off, just to make people more aware of the energy that we produce that we can capture.

[@georgewu5]

I could see a lot of advantages to go this way: saving water and eliminsting the weight of soil in the high-rise structure Thanks very much for the informnation. There is a future to jave vertical farms. George Wu, AIA 2012-5-18

[@chiefster11]

Hopefull mankind can work together to achieve this goal.

[@georgewu5]

1/ Because growing plants in a tower is possible, I designed a farm for each family in the 54 floors of 4 towers with 4 skybridges connecting them, there would not be necessary for people jumping out of the windows like the World Trade Center in 2001. 2/ Great Wall Village is built over the railroads and Highways from city to city, all over the world. people do not have to down payment a car to go to work any more.It is Corbusier's great idea, not mine. George Wu, AIA 2012-6-4

[@ExplainingTheFuture]

@onewholearth Yes, indeed. And it is sad that we therefore don't try to transform our systems of agriculture when it may still be relatively easy to do so. In 20 years making the change will be far more painful.

[@ExplainingTheFuture]

@lemsip It would indeed be more ecologically sound if most people did not live in cities, but they do, and that is unlikely to change near-term. So we need to work out how to make our **existing** cities more self-sufficient

[@ExplainingTheFuture]

Vertical farms are just starting to be built. Checkout, for example, "The Plant" in Chicago, and the "Plantagon" in Sweden. I will be posting a vertical farms update here soon highlighting these developments and others in China and South Korea.

[@dtrez09]

@ 03:21 That tram is going to Phoenix Park in Nottingham! I get that tram all the time!

[@LukeSkyscraper]

It's not a bad idea.. However for plants to grow you have to consider two essential things. Sunlight and irrigation. You're going to need some extensive hydroponics to supply everything below the hundredth floor. Also, how do you plan to harvest each floor?. I'm not saying it wouldn't work because it certainly could be made to work. I'm just staying that there are costs and logistics in this method of production that you've perhaps not considered.

[@ExplainingTheFuture]

@siralucard19 That is an issue! In the vertical farm design shown the individual "pods" are spaced well apart, and mirrors on their lower half help to reflect light. Potentially in vertical farms low-power LED lighting may be used, or else fibre optic light direction technologies. Or we could grown algae or new GM crops that need less light. Some vertical growing systems today physically rotate trays of plants to allow them all to get enough light.

[@ExplainingTheFuture]

@obamabinbiden911 Thanks for your comments. I accept that changes will have to be incremental. There is no reason we could not start to farm some food in existing cities.

[@waswestkan]

I have to believe with smart planning surface farming and around the cities could provide for the nutrition needed by the residents of the cities and surrounding areas. Sure the items presente on the plate will be different, but everyone would get the ration of beef and other nutrition they need to be healthy. These days much of the processed food transported into all markets exists to serve the profits of big corn and everything that grew up aside of big corn. Overall cities are too fragile and vulnerable when in the hand of inept and corrupt managers

[@bmo4411]

You need a hell of a lot more than "smart planning". There's a gradual but steady trend to criminalize private gardening & food growing, ESPECIALLY in & around big cities. That's on account of corporate greed, lobbying & special interest groups, government corruption, a government war on self-sufficiency & self-reliance. The only way to deal with corruption & greed, is be completely destroying it & starting over from the ground up.

[@rossy990888]

Love the Nottingham element of this video

[@RHawkeyed]

@danielmorrisonrhymes My point is you cannot harness that energy with hydraulic plates. The energy you get from this kind of system comes from potential energy in the car. The car is at some height, then presses the plates down transferring that potential energy. The car then has expend energy to get out of the small hole it has just created by pushing the plate down. Piezoelectric elements could possibly do what you say.

[@ExplainingComputers]

@sexy123610 It would be good if we could improve our cities and make them more sustainable all over the world.

[@odalrich]

“For each calorie we consume we need 10 calories of energy” How many calories do we need to build the huge building required to grow our foodstuffs? We must manufacture the different parts of a huge building which must be tranported to a building site in a city; once there it'll have to be assembled until you have the whole building constructed. Are you sure that our food grown in these buildings will be cheaper than the food grown in the countryside? I doubt it.

[@georgewu5]

At 2:10 those stems are connected together symmetrically therefore they are more stable than the CCTV by a Dutch architect who knew nothing about earthquake most of his life ! George Wu, AIA 2012-5-13

[@RHawkeyed]

@ipandah Look at it this way, the hydraulic plates will work by being pressed down. When pressed down there is a hole. Cars use more energy driving on roads with holes. It really is that simple. As I mentioned piezoelectric elements could possibly harvest some of the vibration energy, but is not likely to become very cost effective.

[@felderup]

yes, terraces, or hydroponic tubes mounted horizontally on angled frames would be much more efficient than flat. the building it's in could have a vertical wall, light gets in anyway.

[@mesner5]

the thought of when you walk, you generate electricity, will promote a lot of exercise

[@Alex1891]

Mr Barnatt, what do you anticipate the transition to the lifestyles you describe will be like? It seems that we will eventually need to employ the visions in your video if we want to continue our lives; alas, you'd think that fact would have compelled us to have already implemented them. Do you think we're pretty much at the peak of personal energy enjoyment?

[@ExplainingTheFuture]

Yes -- I think we very much are at the peak of "personal energy enjoyment" -- what a great phrase you have coined! :)

[@danielmorrisonrhymes]

@RHawkeyed No the cars drive the same as they do normally, there's no difference. The energy just comes form the vibrations of the wheels going over the surface. As I said it's not a huge amount of energy, it might be enough to power the traffic lights. But it would be valuable as something to make people think about the energy we can harness contained around us.

[@Threetails]

Actually, we could improve sustainability quite a lot if there weren't such strong restrictions on what crops you can grow and where you can grow them. You can grow carrots on a balcony, but the laws in many jurisdictions actually force city dwellers to rely on industrialized farming. I say liberate the people from groups like Monsanto and their cronies in the US and EU, THEN sustainability will come.

[@Christine.corneille]

Intelligent documentary

[@ExplainingTheFuture]

This all sounds great -- and a load of people working together could do it . . .

[@TheAriusDural]

well, the 5000€/kilo strawberries that could be harvested would hardly find consumers i think. Vertical farms are a nice concept, but way too cost intensive. They should start small and cheap: Use abandonned structures as gardens, rooftops; public and private urban land needs to be used for hobby farmers (meteor man anyone?) in the streets. This needs to be more than one high tech building. Plants cool facades, produce food and regrowing firing material.

[@ExplainingTheFuture]

Ther are lots of companies working on this now -- checkout "The Plant" in Chicago (a working vertical farm), and in particular "The Plantagon", now being built in Sweden. And there's also an experimental vertical farm in Suwon in Korea. Here, as in the Plantagon, plants will rotate on trays to permit access.

[@felderup]

it may come to pass that hooking the outlet tube of our freezers to a tank would be good sense. when it defrosts water, nearly pure, would flow into the tank, it wouldn't be too hard to make -just- a refrigerator based water collector, and there are non-electric, non propane refrigerators. black tubes mounted vertically in the sun, connected to white ones going to the shaded area of a house would cool, suck a straw, it cools, same idea. anything much cooler than the air will collect water.

[@johnytwotimes1]

it's called "distillation", the easiest way is to boil water and catch the steam that comes off. its been proven that the collected water from the steam is nearly 98.9% clean of all bacteria. the easiest is to take a pot, and a lid, boil the water, and use the lid to catch the water. tip the lid, and let the steam run off into a cup, or another pot.

[@RyanAnthonyOwen]

Lots of nice shots of Nottingham there

[@discountconsulting]

Before WWII, North American tires were made of natural rubber grown in South America. The growing global population of automobiles, however, drove the price of the rubber up along with the tires and there was war and tire-rationing. At that point, a synthetic substitute for rubber for tires became marketable because natural rubber tires were simply no longer priceable within reach. The same will gradually happen with food, only it would be better if working urban systems are in place first.

[@mesner5]

@ExplainingTheFuture also the method of producing electricity by walking people would promote a lot of exercise for people.

[@blackopsy9]

the things I think of when I think of a future city are these: upward expansion in the form of skyscrapers across the world. underground roadways to make room for skyscrapers. skyscraper farming... growing in the sky.

[@MatthewHill]

It always bothered me just a little bit that the marbles in the title frame go from rolling to stopped instantly, as that would imply infinite acceleration.

[@Mariusz980]

2:30 - those plants impressive but too expensive in building, farming (without machines) and maintaining. The real solution for lack of food is to move into the oceans and sees - but they get more and more polluted.

[@MikeFlynnHITF]

ya know,, I thought this was about people living in these things and was somewhat disappointed when it was about food, but then I just started watching and was really blown away with the thought and presentation of the whole idea and how it could really work, and then started thinking about all the abandon warehouses let alone the wasted property's their sitting on, right here in Buffalo, we have the Bethlehem Steel building that`s been pretty much abandon since I was born, the city every now and then comes up with some really dumb ideas for it but it never happens, I think at one point they thought of putting a new stadium there for the Bills , they, I should say we, just spent a fortune on wind mills, and this, I think, would be a great place for one of the sky scraper like food growing thing a ma jig, things ,, think about it and look around your city and I`ll guarantee you , you`ll come up with a spot

[@Christine.corneille]

Whatever happen the basics needs must be keep as the most important part to be to threat in first otherwise it will the same as before

[@Christine.corneille]

of course

[@ExplainingTheFuture]

@RHawkeyed Yes, I do see your point -- the energy has to come from somewhere. However, both energy-generating paving slabs and roads with energy-generating hydraulic plates are both in testing at the present time -- I didn't make them up! :-)

[@gkutt5704]

You sound like Dr. Sheldon Cooper on The Big Ban Theory doing 'Fun with Flags' Vexillology ... nicely done!

[@JacobPaige]

I doubt that multi-tiered hydroponic farms would ever be financially viable. Unless the cost of food increased dramatically and they cost far less to build and maintain than they seem like they would.

[@Yeti4President]

I wish I was rich so I could make a city that does not hurt the world as it`s already sufferig. And make it a place of peace, equality for animals and humans. I hope I get supporters for this concept city. Preferably calling it Utopia, meaning perfect paradise.

[@philquinton]

Brilliant video!! i noticed it featured the bulidings in nottingham i was kind of shocked to see them and rather awestruck , helium 4 from the moon i reckon we ought'a extract

[@geothermalenergysour]

The Resource Based Economy as proposed by The Venus Project is our best bet to survive as a civilization in the future. We do have the resources to create a sustainable abundant planet for all humans, but today our biggest obstacle is the money along with gov'ts and corporations which are inhibiting the growth and application of technology. If it wasn't for money we would be using 100% clean renewable energy by now. Instead of worrying about poverty, we would be focusing on innovating.

[@ipandah]

@RHawkeyed I don't think it takes energy from the cars. Just the mechanical energy and friction the car creates as it goes over the pavement. And it doesn't actually take whatever the car is running on. I mean the mechanical energy would just turn into heat, thats why things get hot when you rub them against eachother. However, I can't say for sure because I'm no pro.

[@MarkTuchinsky]

June was the 2nd driest rain month ever only 0.01 inches of rain fell and the driest month, October 1958 no rain fell at all.

[@BenjaminKBroderick]

Do you think that homes could produce most of the needs we have? (fruits, vegetables, reclaimed water, etc.)

[@Kitama23]

I'd like to thank John Lennon for informing us about useful technology to come.

[@bethymears2648]

There should be two water pipes one going into the city. One going out after collecting it from the roof of building and gutters. Go back out to the resivour.

[@ExplainingTheFuture]

That is because I uploaded a captions file with timings in, rather than letting KZbin autotranslate it! I am talking more fluidly on more recent videos. :)

[@jengoh3826]

In China, farmers' land are wrongfully appropriated by the government who sell the land at a very high price to developers, who then erect a bunch of shiny skyscrapers to sell to rich people. Overnight, what was once small villages transform into huge metropolises. But all this is done at the expense of farmers. Vertical farming can be a solution to this social injustice. Government should hire the farmers to work on the vertical farms.

[@MarkTuchinsky]

I heard that where I live, The Wasatch Mountain Range that if we have another bad snow year we will have mandatory water restrictions so in some place like where I live its already Critical and by 2025 it will be even more so.

[@The1NdNly]

farming towers actually are extremely efficient, check out 100% sustainable aquaponics, the use of fish for plant food, worms for fish food and methane for power and heating. besides the point if you take everything at "money value" you wont get anywhere, you need to look at the real benefits that are not measured by the false scale of money. like environmental impact of mass farming in soil, all the chemicals that are used, the actual quality of the food (harvest to eat time etc)nd so much more

[@a7774able]

Interesting idea, and I like your ideas of intensive gardening. I am also a fan of vertical gardening, and I'd like to learn how to do it someday. You do have to wonder, if lands are aren't deforested for farms, are they still safe from other industrial ventures? Farmers generally care about the environment. Others appreciate permaculture. Just "food for thought."

[@OreadNYC]

This is brilliant stuff...it's a shame that we're not doing a lot of this already.

[@Nastuf]

I love these ideas by now we should already had them in place in cites.

[@au-contraire]

Thoughtful and rich in content video, and an interesting website. Cheers!

[@marcopolo3001]

So is South Korea now, and China is building SkyCity One which will be a 200 storey building with an area dedicated to vertical farming. Japan is looking into investing in vertical farming technologies too.

[@ExplainingTheFuture]

There have been many such recent breakthroughs. But they will not be enough to combat Peak Water I'm afraid unless we change our ways too.

[@ExplainingComputers]

@Saphire505 But maybe it will be nice in space one day . . .

[@Bobay4224]

1:05 All I imagine, when the fire comes up, is him crumbling a sandwich bag lololol

[@georgewu5]

3/ using shipping containers 40'x8'x 8'6 as the building "BRICK" and precast concrete Double Tees over the railroads and highways to utililize the air space which were not used in the past. Leave the farms to the farmers. Do not create any more of the suburban spraws than we already have ! George Wu, AIA 2012-6-4

[@KharamiSunato]

THIS IS A MUST SHARE VIDEO PEOPLE ! im going to go hydro on my deck just to cut the use of oil(dead American/Iraqi's soldiers/peoples). I never thought of hyrdo this way before...what a great and smart move. I know I will inspire at least a few of my guests with the set up and this video. Who will follow me? Start small, ok..and do it for the intention..magic, attraction qualities. BTW what sky scraper owner will let his top floors go hyrdo-farming? this is a actionable item : ) more to come-

[@ji3200]

what would happen if Lake Mead in las vegas keep drying? water restriction is enough to solve that?

[@KharamiSunato]

@ExplainingTheFuture here is one easy and fun solution to keep trucks only on the road when needed "" Stack-A-Pots Hanging Planter "" anyone can start growing cheaply and with fun and simply.

[@TheSpartan12321]

Would vertical farming be more efficient if the whole build was in the shape of a pyramid? Like say, the tallest tower is in the center, and it would support the ones around it, and those in turn would support the outside?