Subject: [NEXTEL-1] Wired / Unwired: The Urban Geography of Digital Networks by Anthony M. Townsend

From: [email-masked]
Date: Tue, 05 Aug 2003 03:34:30 -0400

Wired / Unwired: The Urban Geography of Digital Networks

                                        by

                               Anthony M. Townsend

                                B.A. Urban Studies
                             Rutgers University, 1996

                             Master of Urban Planning
                            New York University, 1998

 SUBMITTED TO THE DEPARTMENT OF URBAN STUDIES AND PLANNING IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT
                                        OF
                        THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF

               DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY IN URBAN AND REGIONAL PLANNING
                                      AT THE
                      MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY

                                  SEPTEMBER 2003

                 © 2003 Anthony M. Townsend. All Rights Reserved.

             The author hereby grants to MIT permission to reproduce
                 and to distribute publicly paper and electronic
                copies of this thesis document in whole or in part.

ABSTRACT

This dissertation examines the development of digital network infrastructure in
the worlds great cities at the turn of the
20th century. Drawing upon the concept of cities as information systems and
techniques of communications geography, it
analyzes how the physical components of digital networks were deployed in major
urban areas during the 1990s. It finds that
historical processes and pre-existing differences between places shaped the
evolution of this infrastructure at multiple spatial
scales; global, metropolitan, and neighborhood. As a result, rather than bringing
about the death of distance, digital network
infrastructure actually reinforced many of the pre-existing differences between
connected and disconnected places. With the
telecom bust of 2000-2002, these differences were likely to persist for a decade
or more.

Yet just as the development of wired digital network infrastructure slowed,
wireless technologies emerged as a more
flexible, intuitive, and efficient form of connecting users to networks in
everyday urban settings. As a result, an untethered model
for digital networks emerged which combining the capacity and security of wired
networks over long distances with the
flexibility and mobility of wireless networks over short distances. This new
hybrid infrastructure provided the technology needed
to begin widespread experimentation with the creation of digitally mediated
spaces, such as New York Citys Bryant Park
Wireless Network.

Thesis supervisor: William J. Mitchell
Title: Dean, School of Architecture and Planning

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