Within your area of expertise in engineering, if you had the oppurtunity to build a city from scratch how would it be

Question: Within your area of expertise in engineering, if you had the oppurtunity to build a city from scratch how would it be better than current cities? Try to explain why your idea is better than the other engineers so hopefully this can turn into a debate
- Keywords:
  build,
  city,
  plan
Asked by paulasarmy to Cathy, Jaz, Mark, Roma, Rory on 17 Jun 2014.
- Jaz Rabadia answered on 17 Jun 2014:
  
  Hi Paula.
  
  Great question
  I would build a sustainable and energy efficient city. This would mean we had lots of clean ways of generating electricity, energy efficient buildings and transport and automated controls so things switch off when not required. I would want smart houses that could be controlled through smart phones – eg you can text your house to say switch off lights and turn off heating etc…
  
  If we had this it would be great for us and for future generations
  
  Jaz
- Mark Greaves answered on 17 Jun 2014:
  
  The first thing I’d do would be to decide the location. Ideally on a slope with a nice reervoir at the top (for drinking water) and a decent river or sea at the bottom to discharge sewage into.
  My city would have a water and sewerage network that relied entirely on gravity and sustainable treatment processes. This would hopefully make it very energy efficient.
  I’d make all the buildings have solar panels on the roofs to try and enable people to be energy efficient without needing to think about…if it could be made to have an excess of energy there would be less pressure to keep turning off the lights etc.
  
  Mark
- Cathy Fraser answered on 17 Jun 2014:
  
  Hi Paula
  
  I’d make sure that any power stations were situated centrally with good electricity connections to all major hubs of the city.
  
  I’m not sure this would be popular with the residents of the city though – so in reality it would be getting a balance between central locations and sight-appeal!
  
  Rory and Mark’s thoughts on sustainability would be good to integrate into this – I think it’ll be a combination of our thoughts that would make for a very good city!
- Rory Hadden answered on 17 Jun 2014:
  
  From my area of expertise we would need to look at how we build the buildings to make them as safe as possible. I would keep them as far apart from each other as possible so that the fire brigade can haven easy access and I’d work more with people like Roma so we can make sure the buildings don’t collapse if there is a fire. I would also like most buildings to be made of stone but that would look very boring (although it would be very fire proof!).
  
  I would also like to see more use of waste materials to ensure sustainability – whether this is burning waste to make electricity or plain old recycling and reusing. I would make sure this is integrated into my city.
  
  Finally I’d not allow any cars into the city. Everyone would have to use public transport (electric of course!), walk or cycle. Think how nice the city would be without traffic noise and pollution!!
  
  Rory
- Roma Agrawal answered on 17 Jun 2014:
  
  Excellent question. I would build taller buildings, put all the transport underground and lots of parks between the buildings! That way we can keep the cities smaller and let the countryside be beautiful 🙂