September 19, 2017 - A Day for Reflection
On the advent of an age of “Smart Cities”, of the age of automation, hyper efficient business and highly vibrant and livable communities, the time when we are designing a vision for humans to reach a state of progress that was hard to even imagine only a few years ago, we must not forget about the forces of nature and the way that they may impact our cities, communities and entire nations. It is clear to me that new cities must pay special attention to details involving governance, energy, mobility, waste, infrastructure, healthcare and education but they must not forget about the relevancy of disaster management. In the last few weeks we have seen devastating storms hit many cities with a never before seen force and frequency. Hurricanes in Houston, Miami, and earthquakes in Oaxaca, Chiapas, Puebla, Morelos and Mexico City, only to name a few. The results have been catastrophic and these cities are facing the disasters in a powerful manner based on humanities strong values of solidarity, unity, and empathy. Responses from government, civilians, academia and enterprises have all been outstanding, heart touching and immediate for each of the cases that I have previously mentioned. These are all aspects of our humanity that must never be lost and I know that if we continue living with these values we will overcome whatever obstacle we face. However, these disasters, specially yesterday’s earthquake in Mexico City, have made me think about these situations from a technologist’s perspective and I have reasoned that the systems for disaster management that we have in our cities need an urgent upgrade. If we upgrade our cellphones, cars and tvs every year, why are we not upgrading our disaster systems as well? The videos and images that I have seen are clear proof of the lack of technologies and intelligent system enhancements designed specifically for disasters.
During the earthquake people were left hoping for the best inside their office buildings and apartments because evacuation routes were poorly designed, scarce and inaccessible, just the thought of the fear that they must have felt breaks my heart. Are evacuation stairs the best solutions for these cases? Are stairs efficient when you find yourself on the 15th floor of an office building and the earthquake only lasts for 30 seconds? Couldn't we build safety “capsules/rooms/systems” that could be accessible for every person on every floor, equipped with emergency oxygen and food supplies and an effective tracking system that won’t fail due to power issues (Not grid dependant)? And could policy makers incorporate such systems as a default on every new building that is put up? I’m sure we can.
People in rural and poor communities saw everything vanish before their eyes, family and belongings, due to the lack of resilient, modern structures equipped with the latest of material science. Couldn't we design building structures that are highly efficient, resilient and low cost so everyone can have access to them and couldn't we find the best way possible to get them inside the homes of every single person that needs them? Once again, I’m sure we can and I know of projects that are working on so.
After the earthquake millions of people went out to the streets to help. Government, civilians and enterprises started doing all they could to get the resources needed (Food, medicine, tools, and experts) to the areas where entire buildings had collapsed. The city was pure chaos and resources had quite a hard time arriving to the emergency spots. People could not find their friends and families, they were in shock and disoriented. Couldn't we design systems for localization that are not based only cellular networks, wifi and bluetooth? Couldn't we design systems of transportation for food, medicines, and tools used only for emergencies based on the principles of the Hyperloop transportation system so that key resources could be available in critical areas in less than 1 hour? And finally, couldn't we design a way for every civilian to truly learn how to deploy and manage said systems and initiatives so that help can be supplied when needed? The answer is another firm YES!
This is a call to reflection to every architect, politician, engineer, city planner, technologist, designer, doctor and anyone else who might be concerned, to think about ideas that could help us solve these problems, to think about integral and scalable solutions. Let us not wait until another disaster takes our loved ones, let us not wait until something happens in our city or home country. We must start developing these solutions NOW. I am convinced that the deployment of robust technologies and systems of intelligence designed specifically for disaster management enhancing humanities values of solidarity, unity and empathy will forge the progress of our cities and communities and will help us save the lives of millions of people in the future.
Andres Rico