COMUNIDAD DIGITAL, AN EARLY VISION OF THE CONNECTED CITY
Madrid, SPAIN · 2004
FROM
DIGITAL CITY TO
HUMAN CITY
Before the term Smart City became widely established, Comunidad Digital explored what a fully connected urban environment could look like.
Developed through the collaboration of companies, public institutions and technology partners, the initiative brought different technologies together around the spaces and services of everyday urban life.
The evolution continues
Comunidad Digital began by asking how technology could transform the city. Years of working with cities, governments, companies and urban specialists gradually led me to a different question:
AN EVOLVING VISION
DIGITAL CITY
Connecting technologies
↓
SMART CITY
Connecting urban systems
↓
HUMAN CITY
Connecting everything around people
What kind of city do people actually want to live in?
That question marks my evolution from Smart Cities towards The Good City — a human-centred approach in which technology, infrastructure and urban design become means rather than ends.
A city built at full scale
Across approximately 5,000 m², a full-scale urban environment was created — almost like a film set — including 80–120 m² homes, a hotel, hospital, bank, school, government facilities, post office, tax administration, streets, simulated parking areas, parks and gardens.
The objective was not simply to display individual technologies, but to demonstrate how different companies, institutions, technologies and urban services could work together as part of one integrated city.
