Networked Urban Public Space Mary Derrico

Networked Urban Public Space | Globally Connected, Locally Rooted

Using the intersection of Wall Street and Water Street in Lower Manhattan as a laboratory, this thesis tested how a change in the tangible design and spatial limitations of physical, public space can establish and foster spatial repercussions of virtual, private activity upon physical public space. A response to this may yield a new form of public space where the existing segregation of local public space and the adjacent globally connected workplaces will be diminished. As a result, the focus might shift to generating a public space that not only supports and responds to the engagement in virtual private activity but also begins to blur the once distinctive line segregating these two programmatic elements.

The communication of information has been historically linked to the formation, organization and utilization of public spaces within a city. Recent advancements in communication technologies have stimulated the virtual network to be a significant method in the transfer and distribution of information. Mobile communication devices, such as the smartphone, allow people to engage in private, virtual activity within local public spaces, which subsequently generates an alteration in the behavior and dimension of space of the user. While the coexistence of local public space and the global digital networked system supports a minimal link between the physical and virtual, this relationship, however, significantly lacks spatial implications that could thus serve to facilitate a heightened interaction between the physical and virtual.