Workshop 3: Future Cities and Regions

Organiser

Dr Mark Birkin, University of Leeds

Cities are an important global phenomenon. The majority of the world's population live in urban areas. As well as being centres of prosperity and wealth creation, cities around the world are also bedevilled by pollution, social deprivation, congestion, and crime. In addition to the practical challenges which are presented by urban planning, cities are of great interest to academics from a wide variety of domains, including geographers, historians, sociologists, economists and anthropologists.

An exciting development in recent years has been the development of urban simulation games which seek to test the ability of a player to exercise insight and judgement in the manipulation of imaginary urban environments. Whilst one might argue convincingly that training in such games should be compulsory for city planners, an even stronger case can be made for the construction of city simulation tools which reproduce the key features of real urban environments.

In practice, cities cannot be detached from the regional hinterlands on which they depend. Indeed there is an important set of questions about balanced growth within and between regions.

Such a project demands the integration of data from all kinds of sources, including satellite and land use data, census demographics, economic and business activities, and data relating to transport and migration. The development of appropriate real world simulations requires a computational intensity which is several orders of magnitude greater than their gaming equivalents. International collaboration provides a means for sharing resources in the creation of component modules, and also to share the outcomes from experience in a variety of policy contexts. Policy analysis using demographic and social information about individuals may be not only precious but also sensitive and confidential.

Presentations:

• Modelling and Simulation for e-Social Science (Moses), Mark Birkin, University of Leeds
• Urban spaces: networked ecumene - a planning perspective, Peter Bibby, University of Sheffield
• The 'Future Cities' Research Initiative, Martin Clarke, University of Leeds
• Interoperability and Spatial Data Sharing for e-Society, T. John Kim, University of Illinois
• GIS and the Grid, Mike Mineter, National Centre for e-Science
• Virtual London: Online Public Participation, 3D-GIS and Virtual Worlds, Andy Hudson-Smith, University College London