Artificial Intelligence and the City

Urbanistic Perspectives on AI

17/06/2024, h. 14:30
Politecnico di Milano, Campus Leonardo, Edificio 12, Sala Riunioni, 2° piano
Piattaforma Teams

Innovation in artificial intelligence (AI) is transforming cities in unprecedented ways. In this presentation Professor Cugurullo explores the connections between AI and the urban by focusing on the concept of urban AI and reflecting on its most prominent incarnations, such as autonomous vehicles, urban robots and city brains. He then sees how the emergence of urban AI is producing a new urbanism, an AI urbanism, that originates from smart urbanism but also departs from it along three main axes, namely function, presence and agency. Empirically, he draws on the findings from several international case studies to examine the repercussions of urban AI and give evidence of how the emergence of AI in cities is reshaping urban society, urban infrastructure, urban governance, urban planning and urban sustainability. Furthermore, he discusses how the city, far from being a passive recipient of new technologies, is influencing and reframing AI through subtle processes of co-constitution. The presentation concludes with a warning about the impending risks posed by multiple urban AIs, but also with an invitation to politically engage as citizens with increasingly autonomous cities that might forever escape our understanding and thus our control.

Relatore

Federico Cugurullo, Trinity College Dublin

Responsabili

Davide Ponzini, Zachary M. Jones

Photo credits: Image by Eleonora Casetta