72. Trying Not to Think About Time

Show Notes

Intro/Outro: “Trying Not to Think About Time,” by The Futureheads

--

Discussed:

• Unfrozen’s 2023 Spotify Wrapped Stats: 
  • Most Popular Episode: “Show Me the Bodies” with Peter Apps
  • Most Shared Episode: “Untimely Meditations, Virtual Repatriations,” with Era Merkuri and Martin Gjoleka + Chidi Nwaubani
• After School Newsletter by Casey Lewis
• Unfrozen’s Favorites of 2023:
  • Attending the Venice Biennale during previews, including Sir Peter Cook’s assertion that, while at their event and on their payroll, NEOM would be less than half-built and eventually devolve into shantytowns
  • “Moving the Monolith, Speed-Running the Follies,” with Andreea Ion Cojocaru and Nick Kauffman
  • “The Atlas of Space Rocket Launch Sites,” with Brian Harvey and Gurbir Singh. Greg was channeling Geoff Manaugh’s BLDGBLOG
  • “Smaller Cities in a Shrinking World,” with Alan Mallach
  • “Renewing the Dream” with James Sanders

• 2024 Doomscroll:
  • NEOM meets the Metaverse at Aquellum + Zaha Hadid’s Minas Morgul tower, Discovery at Trojena
  • You won’t have Charlie Munger to kick around anymore
  • CES is underway, and so is the metaverse rebranding
  • Apple Vision Pro
  • Meta Wayfarer Ray-Bans
  • Want work? You need to kneel before the PIF
  • Are architects and engineers really building the future for Saudi’s young? Or are they just taking the money and running
• Half the world’s population will vote in 2024
• No election scheduled in Canada, but in 2025, things are looking topsy-turvy:
  • Canada is “three NIMBYs in a trenchcoat” right now
  • Households now owe more in mortgage debt than Canada’s entire GDP
  • Pierre Poilievre and the Canadian Conservatives seem to be the only ones taking the housing crisis seriously, and the kids are listening
  • CHMC can’t just straight-up build affordable housing – why?
• But it’s good real estate vibes in the US once rates get cut
• Freedom Cities
• California Forever
• You can build it – but who will insure it?
• Will San Francisco exit its doom loop in 2024? What cities will pull ahead?
• Gensler doubles down in its hometown + Shvo to the rescue at the Transamerica Pyramid
• Greg draws a picture of the work-from-home, AI-driven, obesity-drug-taking hellscape called America
• People are competing for walkable urbanism everywhere because we can’t seem to build any new housing
• Could consumer branding of residential real estate boost housing construction?
  • Welcome to the Neighborhood! Wall Street Designed It
  • Culdesac – build-to-rent walkable urbanism in Tempe, AZ
  • WeWork’s Adam Neumann starts Flow
• Dead mall resurrections
• Easton Town Center, Columbus
• Retrofitting Suburbia, Ellen Dunham Jones and June Williamson

--

Engagements Preview 2024:

• “Don’t Believe the Hype: Cities are Alive and Well,” University of Maryland Baltimore, 22 February
• “Using Augmented Reality to Drive Inclusive City Development,” SXSW, Austin, 10 March
• Smart City Expo USA, New York, 22-23 May
• CTBUH International Conference, London and Paris, 23-27 September