Claustrophobia.
Many major cities, already with a population packed in tight, tried this ultra high density living. They failed. Many failed so badly that they had to be torn down and replaced with medium density housing projects. Think Mother Cabrini.
Humans are not meant to live that way.
Ok, think about Mother Cabrini if you wanna. However, thinking “Cabrini-Green” would probably fit more with this thread. Or don’t listen to me at all. Probably your best bet.
I don’t think there’s much chance of that.
It seems appropriate to cite to the Walled City of Kowloon.
Hey thanks you all for your opinions, I am trying to build and defend why it would be a good reason to do something this far out.
I know it is really a huge sacrifice on the part of all people involved, but once the ball was rolling, a society like the one I briefly described above could really flourish.
I know there A LOT of holes in the planning and many things have not been addressed, but then again, I am just one person, so useful input, angry, childish, or intelligent, helps me build a better system that may just work.
You can’t make all the problems in the world disappear by building huge structures, no matter how fancy.
Things like garbage and other waste would always be addressed as a huge concern, because it is, no matter how advance the society. Everyone has to eat and everyone has to go to the restroom.
How would you guy’s and gal’s suggest fixing these problems or flaws that we already have.
And dude, I have a job, and I get paid well enough to have extra every check, even after I blow it on something stupid. I enjoy the luxury, but it is really frustration knowing that is how it’s going to be for the next 30 years and if I can have that, why do other people who got “Lucky” and were born somewhere bad, get left out.
I would rather spend my time thinking of ways to REALLY fix these problems, not just a quick fix.
Wouldn’t waste management be way easier if we didn’t waste so much to begin with?
Using mostly goods that could be reused?
And what is the perfect way to live, since everyone thinks a box is a jail cell?
Bio waste, wouldn’t it be simple if there were centralized structures, or is there a more efficient way of providing restrooms for everyone.
A lot of waste simply happens from neglect, like a boat not being used, or a car sitting in a drive way for 5 years, canned goods sitting in the sun because it cost too much to ship them somewhere they can be used. Why should everyone get one of everything, when they only use it when they want or need to?
What is the best form of CHEAP transportation (for the Masses or for a single person)?
And not to keep bringing it up, if there were many Mega Structures, instead of a bunch of small homes, wouldn’t matters of transportation be simpler? Most of your long distance travel could be handled by a cheap and fast transportation system. And local can be handled by walking or a transit system that runs often and all day? Especially if it is automated?
And I know we have thing like this in place, but they are slow, inefficient, and don’t go everywhere in the city. The farther you get from downtown, the harder it is to find a bus. For some people that is an everyday problem. Not that walking every hurt anyone.
How to create food abundance? Farmlands are falling apart, what do we do once it is all gone? Eat cows every day?
Keep the suggestions coming, I really appreciate it.
Don’t assume that.people are angry, childish or ignorant just because they disagree with you.
For my part, I’d suggest looking at the sorts of problems that happen when people have been put in high-density, low-cost accommodation that we already have - council tower blocks, slums, Kowloon walled city, etc. It’s not pretty and I dont think the problems are necessarily the kind that can just be designed away. They’re a fundamental effect of crowding - almost like the way gases behave in certain predictable ways when compressed.
Cabrina-Green is a better example of why public housing doesn’t work. Cabrina-Green had only has 15,000 residents.
Stuyvesant Town—Peter Cooper Village has 25,000 residents. The big problem there is that NYC Rent Stabilization laws mean that most of the residents are paying far below market rents and some of the residents are very influential. This is quite remarkable, since we talking about buildings over 60 years old.
There will be a need for cheap mass housing soon.
As some folks may have noticed, the economy has recovered - if you only consider corporate profits. But unemployment is still high. That is because every corporation can maximize profits by hiring as few people as possible. Even the lowest paid jobs are being either automated out of existence or off-shored.
Your design sounds like a great solution for warehousing the huge mass of permanently unemployed and unemployable human beings who weren’t lucky enough to be born the sons or daughters of corporate executives.
Oh, I’m sure you could do a lot better than that. You can skip the belongings part completely; they’re unnecessary for human survival. The bunks can be more like 6x2x1 feet. Actually, that’s probably generous: if we divide people up by height, we can get a lower overall occupied volume. >6 ft people can get something longer, too.
Using robotic transport systems, like some parking lots or warehouses, means very low overhead. Probably much less than 2x is sufficient.
Waste disposal will be handled via catheter, etc. and recycled into intravenous nutrition fluid.
All in all we can pack everyone in a volume 2.5x2.5 miles and 1000 feet high. Who signs up first?
lol dude, i said angry, childish, or intelligent.
that sounds awesome, i’m totally in!
Can’t remember the name of the author [Spinrad?] but in the book “Little Heroes” a dystopian novel, the great unemployed masses live on the dole in slums eating a ration of people kibble. There just are not enough jobs to go around, and people turn to crime and work under the table for spending money. Housing, people kibble and medical care are free from the government, can’t remember if they handed out drugs as well but there was essentially government sponsored entertainment, MTV style channels.
Actually, come to think of it, there are several novels that I have read that had the great mass of people living on the dole in a similar manner, though some books have people with a 1 day or half day work week to spread the few jobs out amongst the population, unless you were really gifted enough to get a scholarship to become something like a doctor or nurse, or scientist of some sort.
I actually think the greater mass of the population of the world would be thrilled to live in a standardized apartment [1 bedroom for singles, couples, 2 bedrooms and up for the number of kids you have] with high speed internet, full access digital cable, a ration card for food and drink, medical care, and a nominal job of a few hours a week to make some spending money for luxuries like something better than a basic computer, a game system and games, or better clothing. Unfortunately the majority of the people on earth are devolving into Idiocracy.
Before another person makes a post about how we cant afford to build things like this… take cant afford out of your vocabulary and replace it with, how many people would it take to build?
How many man hours? How many educated people? Are there enough resources in the first place?
If you were the emperor of the world(whatever you want to call it), And you had total power, and you were challenged with making everything run efficiently, AND everyone was behind you, all the people.
What would you do to make things work for you and them.
here are some good pictures of other peoples mega structures and future cities possibilities.
Jacque Fresco and the Venus Project
http://www.thevenusproject.com/en/technology/city-systems
Wired
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/11.04/suburb.html
Crystal Island: (currently in the works)
http://inhabitat.com/tallest-skyscraper-in-the-world-coming-to-moscow/comment-page-1/
Bionic Tower
http://www.torrebionica.com/bvs-english/bvs-english.htm
X-SEED 4000:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X-Seed_4000
http://inhabitat.com/self-contained-tokyo-highrise-eco-city-x-seed-4000/
Sky City 1000:
http://www.emporis.com/application/?nav=building&lng=3&id=135989
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sky_City_1000
Shimizu Mega-City Pyramid
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shimizu_Mega-City_Pyramid
Well, for me, if I could just get rid of the rest of you, I’d have a lovely little planet to share with my family and other loved ones. Let’s start brainstorming that one!
From what I can see, the frog is halfway to boiled already.
The shit jobs that are “always hiring” are no longer hiring. The shit jobs of the 1960s - gas jockey, soda jerk, paperboy, etc. - no longer exist. There may be a handful of examples of those jobs still around, but they are an anomaly. My wife and I were out at the movies last night, and the theater was renovating their snack bar to eliminate all soda dispensing. Instead, they have installed high tech soda dispensing machines with touch screens that dispense nearly 100 flavor combinations. Even when you’re paying 4 for a cup of soda that costs maybe .10, management will figure out how to eliminate a minimum wage job.
We’re at the point where we are going to become either a utopia or a dystopia. Both are equally possible, but the fact that the folks at the top appear to be sociopaths who can never have enough wealth means the latter is more likely. Warehousing people at subsistence level is the best we can expect from them.
Actually if you want to try this out this system, all you have to do is join the Navy. Back when my father was in the Navy, he didn’t even get a bunk. Just a place to hang his hammock.
Since I calculated with the population density of Manhattan the whole human would fit in Colorado, I don’t think we need to go that extreme unless we are designing a star ship. BTW, in James Blish’s Cities in Flight stories they converted the island of Manhattan into a star ship.
I still like the idea of converting cargo containers into cheap housing. I was talking to a friend of mine in Japan and it turned out that her apartment was smaller than a cargo container. I think her apartment may have been smaller than my closet.
Some other mega structures from fiction:
The Tyrell Corporation Building from Blade Runner
Olympus City arcologies from the anime/manga Appleseed.
Future NYC from The Fifth Element
Mega City One from Judge Dread
Not too many of these cities look like utopias.
It’s not that we “can’t” build those things. Although some of the designs are physically impossible without exotic materials like carbon nanotubes and space-age polymers and whatnot. It’s that those workers, man hours, educated engineers and other resources might be better utilized elsewhere in the economy.
Also consider this. You create a giant monolithic structure designed for 250,000 people. Lets assume it takes 5-10 years to build such a thing. What happens if the population doubles? Or half the population migrates away? Do you cordon off vast abandoned areas of mister_mistropolis when it’s underpopulated? Do huge shanty towns and favella style slums develop around the perimeter when it becomes overcrowded? Or the oppposite, how do you keep it from becoming a giant warehouse for poor people while the wealthy live off in more traditional detached homes in the surrounding countryside?
Whatever. The point is that people react badly to the idea of living in a human termite mound, which is not just an inconvenience in this discussion - it’s an indicator of a problem with the idea itself.