The concept of “Distributed Cities” is a very interesting direction to explore, with a city that governs and manages itself automatically, and could be “mapped as a discontinuous scattering of nodes and pieces”, making up a “larger whole”. But I think current cities already have similar aspects, for example how Hong Kong has Central as its economic center, and I would also like to know how the “distributed cities” can improve the lives of those who aren’t fortunate enough to live in upper-class areas.
Similarly, the concept of “Migrating Cities” is also fascinating to discuss, where cities could relocate themselves. But how many of these cities can we build? What are the social implications of such cities? What happens to those who don’t live on these moving cities? There are many social and ethical considerations before these “Migrating Cities” can become reality, but nonetheless they are interesting for city planning.
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You have asked a couple of intriguing questions in your essay. It would be great if you can elaborate more on at least one of them, for example, the social implications of such cities. One of the underlying messages in the film was that the classification was done by functionality, almost like the distributed city concept introduced in Carl Abbot’s piece, where one city has a specialised function, distant from the other. In this realm, identity is clearly defined by one’s role in the community. Would the application of distributed city concept narrow or broaden the existing social (class) distance? You could narrate your argument through some (or all) of the questions you posed and might be surprised at how far it can get you.