What are Arcologies?
Techquickie
·Techquickie
·2017-05-06
·
959 words · ~4 min read
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By now, you've probably heard a lot of the dire warnings about how the world's
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population is growing at an unsustainable rate and we're consuming
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far too many resources. Discussed solutions range from the practical to
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the absolutely fantastical. But unless you're an
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intractable nihilist that doesn't care about the survival of the human race,
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you'll probably agree that we have to figure the problem out at some point.
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And one of the most interesting ideas that has been proposed is the concept of
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the archology. Large self-contained
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communities with minimal impact on the environment. But is this just the stuff
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of science fiction? Or might millions of people be living in such a structure one
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day? And just what the heck would that look like anyway? Well, archaeologies
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have been conceptualized many ways, from tall skyscraper-l like structures to
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self-sufficient groups of buildings closer to the ground. But they all have
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one thing in common, some way to more
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densely pack living, working, and
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recreationing spaces along with infrastructure to improve efficiency and
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cut down on pollution and waste. Whoa, whoa, hold the phone there, Lionus. This
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sounds like some sort of nightmare where we're all living in little sleeping pods
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and eating meals in pill form. Well, it's not. In fact, there are real life
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archology projects in the works right now. The most prominent of these is
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probably Masdar city in Abu Dhabi. This
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is an area of six square kilometers being developed with features like
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automated driverless pods for transportation, a large solar plant,
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water recycling, and creative use of architecture to provide forced air
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cooling without the need to suck tons of power, including a 150 foot tall wind
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tower that flushes air downwards. Pretty
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cool. But Mastar lacks the wow factor
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superstructure appearance that has been commonly depicted NVIDIA games like
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Sim City and DSX. For something like
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that, you'll have to go to Russia, where a project called Crystal Island is being
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planned. And yes, the name is quite apt. At nearly half a kilometer tall with 27
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million square feet of floor space, it would be one of the largest man-made
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structures in the world. With the
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outside covered by a special skin whose
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purpose would be to provide climate control depending on the season and with
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power provided by the sun and the wind.
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The interior would be a mix of residential, commercial, and educational
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spaces. though there's no word yet on whether transportation will be provided
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by a fleet of horses. Of course, as you might expect,
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such massive undertakings tend to run into roadblocks. There are indeed people
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already living and working in Mastar City, but completion has been pushed
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back several times, and we may not see the finished product for more than a
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decade. And the developers have actually backed off their promise of complete
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carbon neutrality anyway. As for Crystal Island, they haven't even broken ground
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yet, partly due to the late 2000s financial crisis. So, it's not
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surprising that it's more common to see places that use archology concepts
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instead of fullyfledged, self-sufficient, highly integrated
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cities. The Las Vegas strip, for example, features pedestrian walkways
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and bridges connecting many of the casinos, hotels, and businesses so that
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you're often not walking down the street itself. and in many cases don't even
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have to go outside to get from point A to point B. And if we're only talking
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about the idea of containing things in a single building, large new skyscrapers
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like the Shanghai Tower in China are increasingly borrowing ideas from
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archies. Not only does the Shanghai Tower feature a kind of insulating skin
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similar to what was imagined for Crystal Island, it has a prominent twist in it
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which helps to repel wind that could otherwise cause the building to sway
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without having to use extra construction materials. And although it's connected
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to the main electrical grid, wind turbines at top the building provide
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around 350,000 kilowatt hours of extra power
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per year for the offices and hotel rooms underneath.
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But although projects like these might be giving us a glimpse at the future of
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urban living, there's a debate swirling as to whether archylike structures that
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are ultimately built will actually help us solve our problems with resource
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consumption and overpopulation or if they'll just turn into enclaves for the
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wealthy. But don't despair if it turns out you're not loaded enough to be on
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