Towards the development of a 3D digital city model as a real extension of public urban spaces

 In many town planning contexts, 3D city models are mainly used and designed as if they were analogue models, and they play the same role as analogue models, i.e. they are simple representation and presentation models of urban projects.  Much effort and energy are spent on making the models as real as possible, which in many cases blurs the difference between the real and the fictive. The projects look as if they had already been realised and do not invite debate. In this respect, there is no paradigm shift in the design and use of digital 3D models. A digital model makes no sense in its own right; it only serves as a tool in the analogue world. The model is a passive picture for contemplation.

 

Another way of looking at a digital 3D model is to see it not as a virtual model of reality but as a real model that must fulfil real functions and to design it as a space of transition between the local analogue space and the global space of flow. We call that place the Electronic Neighbourhood.

 

The Electronic Neighbourhood was developed and implemented in connection with a real urban regeneration project realised in the period from 2001 to 2004, following which it was evaluated.

 

The paper outline the concept of the Electronic Neighbourhood through the presentation of the project, and it will show how the concept can be applied to link the local space of place with the ‘global city'. Some of the themes discussed in the paper are:

 

• The interdependency between analogue and digital approaches: how events that begin in the analogue world can be transferred to the digital world, and how events in the digital world require similar events in the analogue world to succeed.
• The need to define the development of ICT in the urban regeneration process as a goal. Business as usual can be deadly in efforts to develop new approaches to communication and participation.
• Who controls the Electronic Neighbourhood? Just as in the analogue world, control of central places in the digital world is power.

 

Finally, based on the experience gained in relation to the project, the paper will outline some guidelines for better integration between the analogue and digital worlds as a crucial aspect of the urban regeneration process in post-modern society.