This was in the Sunday Mail on the weekend (sorry, no link). It could probably go in any one of a number of threads, but there's some relevance here (as bolded and underlined).
Sunday Mail Adelaide, Adelaide
10 Jun 2012
Supplements, page 6
The new CBD: Connected, built up and digitalised
THE buildings may be taller and our city streets busier by 2062, but innovative technology will be the greatest driver of change in Adelaide over the next 50 years.
The CBD skyline will be altered with new apartment towers set to sprout in city streets across the coming decades following the recent raising of height restrictions. And if our plethora of present masterplans progress ahead as planned, the CBD will no longer be vacant on weeknights but grow to become a 24-hour vibrant city as locals and visitors make the most of a redeveloped Rundle Mall, a bustling Victoria Square, a 50,000-capacity sport stadium and a revamped West End precinct.
According to University of Technology research principal Peter Rickwood, rapid wireless internet throughout the entire city, including the parklands, will also see more people studying and working in the CBD, even using "virtual office hubs". With the National Broadband Network developments, it's possible you could see virtual office facilities, where you commute to your local hub if you can't get into the city office that day and have basically video conferencing facilities on steroids," Dr Rickwood said. "You'll get hologram images of the other people at your office in the city and even be able to do things like draw on a communal whiteboard together."
If the State Government's 30-year plan holds up, the population of greater Adelaide will have grown by at least 560,000, with 258,000 more homes. At least 60 per cent of the new housing will be built within 400m of shops and 800m of public transport, in what has been pitched as "transport-oriented development". The population target for the CBD itself is 55,000 by 2040. The number of city dwellers peaked at 43,000 in 1915 and is now about 20,000.
The target is one Lord Mayor Stephen Yarwood believes we'll have easily achieved by 2062. An urban planner and futurist, Mr Yarwood expects the city's residential population to boom as Adelaide begins to offer quality high-rise city apartments with "sweeping views from the hills to our beaches".
"Within 50 years, you would certainly expect a different looking skyline with the developments in engineering, changed flight paths and higher buildings," he said. "We'll have an underground rail system servicing North Tce, Victoria Square and all four of the terraces and connecting Noarlunga to Elizabeth in a high-speed 30-minute fast train. "You'll be able to check in for a flight at Vic Square, board an underground fast-train and be at the airport within 10 minutes."
Mr Yarwood says Adelaide will also be a leader in implementing technological developments. "Our entire public space, be it streets, parks or public transport, will have fully immersive high-speed wireless," he said. "Technologies like augmented reality (where graphics and other digital information is laid over what the eye can see, using projectors, hand-held devices or special head-gear) will assist in directions, history and information on the city."
Our most sought-after city real estate will be trendy apartments built along the edge of the southern side of the River Torrens, capitalising on the vibrancy created by a revamped Riverbank precinct and Adelaide Oval, according to the Urban Development Institute of Australia's South Australian executive director Terry Walsh. "We have a jewel on that southern side of the Torrens, just sitting there with dead water rats," he said. "I see opportunities to create fantastic apartment living and coffee shop precincts from further east of the zoo right through to Thebarton."
Mr Walsh said innovative developments taking off in Europe now, including contemporary shopping centres with modern housing on the second level and lawn and gardens on the roof, could transform Adelaide over the next 50 years. The quirky developments could also include double-stacked two-storey townhouses and would help achieve urban infill by attracting young professionals and families to inner-city living, he said.
Mr Walsh also predicted Adelaide would have a second airport by 2062. "I don't think it will be Parafield, but the rate of development in our northern area will mean we'll have to have another gateway airport in the north," he said.
Experts say cars will still be a common mode of transport but not the petrol-guzzling machines we drive today. Predominantly electric, they'll be plugged in at night and charged through a smart power grid using local renewable energy. "Driver-less" taxis, which will travel automatically across Adelaide using cameras and sensors, will ferry commuters from their homes to transport hubs with high-speed underground trains and better developed bus networks. Trams will loop the CBD and extend into our character-laden inner-city suburbs, including Prospect, Unley and Norwood, and an explosion in popularity of electric bikes could force "bike only hours on select city streets during peak hour.
Vast slabs of bitumen roads such as West Tce will shrink to make way for dedicated bikeways, wider and greener footpaths, more outdoor dining and an increased cafe culture. If ideas being submitted to the State Government and City Council's 5000+ initiative is anything to go by, Adelaide could also have a congestion charge or toll for the city and Hindley and Rundle St will have become pedestrian malls.
In 50 years, Adelaide will have become "a 24-hour city like New York but without the massive high rises", the Property Council of Australia's SA executive director Nathan Paine predicts. "Currently our activation in the city is running eight to 10 hours on an average day," he said. "I think we'll hit 15 to 18 hours' activation in the next five to 10 years and in 50 years' time we will be the place where you can live a 24-hour lifestyle. In the initial instance, the activation is going to be around small bars, more outdoor dining and entrepreneurial uses of spaces. We can extend the city pretty quickly to 18-hours activation with that. Then with population grown, more businesses here, changes like high-speed broadband and more spaces people want to use and feel safe in, there's no doubt in my mind (24-hour activation) will all happen over time in the next 50 years."
Mr Paine said Adelaide needed to be a leader in embracing technological advances to shape our city over the next 50 years. "It's not about predicting what's going to come, but keeping an open mind and implementing this new technology as soon as possible so Adelaide is innovative and leads the way," he said.