What is the future like? Human beings are always full of curiosity and reverie about the other side of time. As a result, development and exploration has become an eternal topic for mankind to open up wasteland in the future. In many science fiction movies, there is no lack of imagination about the future of the city.
In Star Wars, on the planet named Coruscant, the urban architecture has developed to the extreme, and a huge dome represents the heart of the Galactic Republic; in Blade Runner, the director adopts such artistic techniques as postmodernism, deconstruction and high-tech school to express the famous cyberpunk city-Los Angeles; the film “The Fifth Element” shows the urban planning concept of French architect Le Corbusier, who advocates a three-dimensional network, and the film also depicts the air traffic network that improves the efficiency of urban operation.
Star Wars stills
“Blade Runner” stills
The Fifth Element.
The collision of architecture and science fiction is a fascinating world. But perhaps, the future is at your feet, and many seemingly unrestricted ideas already exist in front of you.
The shocking idea of building a new city out of thin air seems to exist only in science fiction movies. However, the “rich” Saudi Arabian government has the ambition to turn science fiction into reality. NEOM is a futuristic city construction plan initiated by the Saudi Arabian government. “NEOM” comes from a combination of Latin and Arabic, meaning “new future”, and aims to create a high-tech, low-carbon, and diverse new society.
01 Building a new society on the shores of the Red Sea
NEOM concept map
Mohammed bin Salman, Saudi Arabia’s crown prince and chairman of the board of directors of NEOM, recently announced the detailed plan of NEOM: it connects the Red Sea coast with the mountains and upper valleys of northwestern Saudi Arabia and consists of two mirror buildings parallel to each other.
NEOM concept map
At NEOM, everything is linear, no cars, no streets, no carbon emissions, completely AI-driven, and 95% of the natural environment will be protected. At the same time, the entire city is made up of a series of interconnected communities, each capable of providing all the services and facilities that residents need in their daily lives.
NEOM concept map
In addition, NEOM will also be the largest and longest building in the world -200 meters wide, 500 meters high and 170 kilometers long. It can be said that the building itself is equivalent to a city. The Saudi crown prince aims to overturn the traditional horizontal city and make it “the world’s first zero gravity vertical city”, which will also be one of the most complex and challenging construction projects in history.
Regarding the future city, mankind has too many ideas to be implemented.
Coincidentally, Vincent Callebaut Architectures Studio plans to transform New York into a cluster of vertical green villages that can respond to climate change, so the project called “Treescrapers” was born. The project, as part of the New York Green New Deal’s net zero carbon goal, will extend from the Bronx to Brooklyn, through Queens.
Treescrapers concept map
In today’s New York, urbanization has exacerbated the impact of heat waves on the population and their well-being and health, and the urban heat island effect, water scarcity and air pollution are gradually eroding human life.
The movie “crazy animal city” hints at the real urban environmental pollution problem
Bionic green solutions Treescrapers village clusters can help combat urban heat island effects, air pollution and soil confinement, while promoting rainwater management, biodiversity conservation and the design principles of urban agriculture, presenting a sustainable lifestyle that is everyone’s responsibility.
02 Vertical green village cluster
Treescrapers concept map
According to the concept of Vincent Callebaut Architectures Studio, Treescrapers village cluster not only saves space and land, but also encourages the development of short-term business, which is similar to the linear city of NEMO in Saudi Arabia. The original intention of both is people-oriented. On the basis of full sense of future, environmental protection buildings are used to enhance the sense of belonging and mutual assistance among communities.
In 1893, the world’s first Ferris wheel was born for the Columbus Memorial Exposition in Chicago. The purpose was to compete with the Paris Tower built by Paris at the 1889 Exposition.
Chicago Ferris Wheel
Today’s Ferris wheel not only carries people’s joy as an amusement facility, but also gradually becomes an important landmark in a city, such as the world-famous London Eye in England and the Ferris wheel of Sparrow Mountain in Russia.
London Eye England
03 Futuristic realism “Seoul Ring”
✦ Moscow Sparrow Mountain Ferris Wheel
✦ Seoul Ring Concept
Has always been very good at making romantic and advocating entertainment South Korea, but also extremely keen to capture the opportunity. At present, South Korea is planning to build the world’s largest non-spoke Ferris wheel-“Seoul Ring” (Seoul Ring) in 2027.
The Ferris wheel is scheduled to be located on (Nodeul Island), a 180-meter-diameter and 153-meter-high island in the Upper Rock Cave Sky Park, Mapo District, Seoul, and can receive tens of thousands of people a day. Seoul City plans to use renewable energy as a power source to make the “Seoul Ring” a gateway to Seoul and a landmark building symbolizing environmental protection policies.
✦ Seoul Ring Concept
It is worth mentioning that, unlike the traditional driving mode of Ferris wheel, the non-spoke Ferris wheel does not have a central cable and relies on the driving wheel to rotate the wheel hoop. At the same time, the shape of this Ferris wheel draws inspiration from the classic silver wedding ring, and adopts a full perspective design. From a distance, it looks like a ring standing between heaven and earth. Under the shining of the setting sun, the sense of science fiction of future realism is instantly Full.
If modern science and technology is a kind of sound language and meticulous algorithm, then the human life accompanied by science and technology is constantly reshaping the whole world with silent poetry.
Nowadays, technology seems to provide almost unlimited possibilities for human beings, and we have more full and moving emotional experiences. Void and reality, dreams and life, people and machines, are all meaningful chapters written in the history of mankind.
(Source: Cc doctrine)
