Module 9: Smart City Technologies in Urban Design

In the era of smart and disruptive digital technology, innovative applications provide opportunity to enhance current and future urban design studies and practices. While technologists and city managers scramble for smart cities, urban design practitioners seems reluctant in adopting smart city technologies as means to provide better data of the physical environment of cities. This module is in two parts; the first will introduce how current concept and state-of-the-art in immersive visualisation methods, such as virtual and augmented reality, are able to simulate the experience of exploring virtual cities and places in real time to assist urban design projects. The second part will introduce smart city concept and method that integrate and apply technological advancements across multiple domains within urban design discipline, including but limited to energy and utility, infrastructure, transportation, the built and natural environment, government administration, health, and education, that seek to tackle prevailing urban design issues at local and global levels. The module concludes by presenting insights into the future potential of smart city technologies providing opportunity to untangle the complex mechanism of human behaviour in public space and a chance to explore sustainable urban forms in the context of Industrial Revolution 5.0.