ICT and the New Urban Development

For an efficient urban planning, society needs to agree on the priority values and objectives, spelling them out in a desired 'scenario'. A new vision of urban plan is needed. Is technology available for whatever scenario ? The answer is positive as can be argued by the two following extreme and caricatural scenarios: • the super-funtionalized and space-specialised city: the sectoralisation of the modernistic city plan that have divided the city space into 'efficient' mono-functional zones (where to work, to shop, to live)-with the citizens hurrying as aliens between zones-can still be increased by the intervention of the new ICT (see the concentration of services in teleports zones). • the virtual-space home-centred city: thanks to the new ICT a super-functional home can be imagined as the place where the individual can stay to perform all the functions (telework, teleshopping, telebank, teleschool, teleplaying) with no need to move others than for leisure. The scenario for a human-centred city could refer to a revisiting of the city of the past where the urban space where organised-at the fine local scale of the quarters-to allow a complex mix of activities and functions. Individuals interacted easily in an informal ways in the streets and piazzas. We refer to this scenario as that of an agora city. The space organisation should in any case favour the natural needs for socialisation of the human being, favouring solidarity and social cohesion, while the technological options should permit to regain the efficiency of the city 'machine'. To revisit the urban plan one can focus on four main functions: shelter, education, work, leisure.