Interesting viewpoint. Would the original Epcot vision have bankrupted Disney? It would have been very expensive, and I'm not sure that the income side would have been sufficient to keep it going. It was supposed to test new technologies and ideas to make cities more habitable and efficient. But how do you justify tens (or even hundreds) of millions of dollars every couple years to install a new transit system, water plant, sewage plant, or electrical generation plant just to see if they'll work better?
Using a city to experiment with a few new things can make sense. Testing a better escalator, window, automatic doors, buses, or other small innovations make sense. That could be done anywhere. But huge infrastructure changes would very likely have been cost prohibitive. I suppose it would have been a popular place to live, and thus people like engineers would pay a premium to live there. But eventually wouldn't even the most forward-looking propeller head get tired of constant new construction and time-consuming upgrades? "Here's our new more durable cement that is cheaper and less polluting. Let's rip out the stuff we installed last year. And sorry about the jackhammers and detours for the second year in a row. We'll be done in a month or two."
Or, "We're switching our power supply again. Nuclear was great in the 60's and early 70's, and solar just isn't reliable enough, as we learned back in the 80s. Clean burning coal was still dirty in the 90's, but now we're going to try ________." Power plants cost hundreds of millions to build, and that is probably one of the top issues for tech innovation. Water plants and sewage plants are equally expensive, and economically it just makes no sense to frequently switch them out.
Plus, if you're NOT going to innovate with these large scale investments, what good is a so called experimental city? Your experiments would just be nibbling at the low cost edges of true innovation, and could be tested anywhere. Honestly, cities all over the world are already trying new things, just like tax credits and government requirements for recycling programs are forcing innovation literally around the world. If that's happening in thousands of cities already, why do we need one city in Florida dedicated to testing? One city can only do so much. Why not let entire countries experiment on a much larger scale?
And, more importantly today, why not let computer simulation take the place of the actual city? You want to improve the morning commute? Fine, input the Chicago road and rail system into a supercomputer and see what comes out. What could one small city in Florida teach snowy Chicago about managing a couple million morning commuters on roads and rails that date back over 100 years? And Chicago could also be one of several test cities for new buses, escalators, doors, and windows. You don't need a faux city in Florida to do that.
Yeah, I have to agree. The original Epcot idea was a pipe dream. By the way, is there any actual evidence that Roy was against it? I'd love to find out.
Using a city to experiment with a few new things can make sense. Testing a better escalator, window, automatic doors, buses, or other small innovations make sense. That could be done anywhere. But huge infrastructure changes would very likely have been cost prohibitive. I suppose it would have been a popular place to live, and thus people like engineers would pay a premium to live there. But eventually wouldn't even the most forward-looking propeller head get tired of constant new construction and time-consuming upgrades? "Here's our new more durable cement that is cheaper and less polluting. Let's rip out the stuff we installed last year. And sorry about the jackhammers and detours for the second year in a row. We'll be done in a month or two."
Or, "We're switching our power supply again. Nuclear was great in the 60's and early 70's, and solar just isn't reliable enough, as we learned back in the 80s. Clean burning coal was still dirty in the 90's, but now we're going to try ________." Power plants cost hundreds of millions to build, and that is probably one of the top issues for tech innovation. Water plants and sewage plants are equally expensive, and economically it just makes no sense to frequently switch them out.
Plus, if you're NOT going to innovate with these large scale investments, what good is a so called experimental city? Your experiments would just be nibbling at the low cost edges of true innovation, and could be tested anywhere. Honestly, cities all over the world are already trying new things, just like tax credits and government requirements for recycling programs are forcing innovation literally around the world. If that's happening in thousands of cities already, why do we need one city in Florida dedicated to testing? One city can only do so much. Why not let entire countries experiment on a much larger scale?
And, more importantly today, why not let computer simulation take the place of the actual city? You want to improve the morning commute? Fine, input the Chicago road and rail system into a supercomputer and see what comes out. What could one small city in Florida teach snowy Chicago about managing a couple million morning commuters on roads and rails that date back over 100 years? And Chicago could also be one of several test cities for new buses, escalators, doors, and windows. You don't need a faux city in Florida to do that.
Yeah, I have to agree. The original Epcot idea was a pipe dream. By the way, is there any actual evidence that Roy was against it? I'd love to find out.
