He led the 2023 Sports Team of the Year. The first team in history to win the Giro d'Italia, Tour de France and Vuelta. Jumbo-Visma sporting director Merijn Zeeman witnessed first-hand how a tightly mapped out policy led to a historic achievement. Jaap de Groot talks extensively with Merijn Zeeman about this unique milestone and the new ambitions of the best cycling team in the world.
Text: Bart-Jan Brouwer
Synthography: Jonathan IJzerman
Last year, the total number of living people on Earth passed 8 billion. And it looks like we haven't grown yet. The world population will continue to increase in the decades ahead, the United Nations expects. According to some calculations, we would reach 2050 billion in 9,7: that is about 20 percent more people in your street... We are already facing a housing shortage and increasingly scarce resources, which will be a major challenge for the future. Especially when you consider that by 2030 more than two-thirds of the world's population will live in large cities. How do we keep our cities livable? According to Bouwend Nederland, a trade organization for companies in the construction and infrastructure sector, technology will play a major role in this. Then you should think of the Internet of Things (IoT) and Artificial Intelligence. A good example is the application of City Brain, a software system developed in 2016 by the Chinese tech company Alibaba. This 'city brain' detects traffic congestion and accidents and ensures better traffic flow. In the pilot city of Hangzhou, this has led to a 15 percent reduction in traffic jams. The system has now been rolled out to other cities within the People's Republic and also to Kuala Lumpur.
It is not only traffic in cities that is increasing. While the total amount of waste worldwide was around 2016 billion tons in 2, it is estimated that this will be around 2050 billion tons in 3,5: 75 percent more garbage bags on your doorstep... Some cities are already using a combination of IoT and sensors to create smart operate waste management systems. Songdo, South Korea, for example, is connected by a garbage truck-free waste management system, in which pneumatic pipes suck waste directly from homes into an underground network of pipes and tunnels connected to a central processing facility. There, waste is automatically sorted and recycled, buried or burned for energy purposes, with the main benefits being greater energy efficiency and lower landfill and energy costs. Waste is also removed via an underground pipe system on Roosevelt Island in New York. And even the Sluisbuurt in Amsterdam, a new sustainable, green neighborhood on the IJ, is being equipped with an underground waste transport system. The increasing influence of technology in the city acts as a magnet for tech companies that see opportunities in urban development. Such as Alibaba, which estimates the market value of a solution like City Brain at $400 billion. And smart cities are also an extremely interesting market for Alphabet, Google's parent company. With home products such as Google Home, expanding to the street is just a small step that yields an exponential amount of data. Of course, the data will have to be protected...
This brings us to the Achilles heel of every smart city: data protection and privacy protection. Quayside, an area development in Toronto, Canada, has been the most promising smart city in the making since 2017. Alphabet wanted to transform the abandoned industrial area of Waterfront Toronto into a hypermodern neighborhood through its own development company Sidewalk Labs. Working with big data would become leading within development. Robot taxis, heated sidewalks, self-driving garbage trucks and a huge digital dashboard were the poster child for the new district. However, Sidewalk Labs wanted to continuously collect user data in order to make adjustments and allow the city to grow with the movements of its residents. For example, if crossings occur more often at a certain intersection, this could be facilitated by the installation of a pedestrian traffic light. The project failed in 2020. According to the developer, it was no longer feasible due to the impact of the corona crisis on the real estate market. Those involved and experts came up with a different explanation: Toronto residents had their doubts about the intentions of a private party that took over from the government. There was also increasing unrest due to the consequences for the privacy of users. That is why a line was drawn through this techno-utopia. A hard lesson for every smart city developer. If it is possible to involve citizens in developments and guarantee privacy, then technology is ready for widespread solutions in public spaces.
Designers, planners and architects all over the world are working on smart city proposals. Quayside didn't make it, who knows if the following projects will be realized in the near future.
1. OCEANIX Busan, South Korea
40 percent of the world's population lives within 100 kilometers of the coast and 90 percent of megacities (>10 million inhabitants) are threatened by rising sea levels. With floating infrastructure we can deal with threatening floods. And so the Danish architect Bjarke Ingels, the UN Habitat and maritime development company Oceanix present the world's first floating city: OCEANIX Busan. That name did not come out of the blue: the city will be located off the coast of the South Korean city of Busan. It consists of interconnected platforms (15,5 hectares in total), which are connected to the mainland via bridges. Initially, the population is assumed to be 12.000, but that number can be expanded to 100.000. The project should lead to groundbreaking technology for vulnerable coastal cities. Because, as UN-Habitat Director Maimunah Mohd Sharif says: “We cannot solve today's problems with yesterday's tools.”
2.Net City, China
Technology giant Tencent, the conglomerate behind WeChat and China's popular QQ messaging service, is working on an almost completely car-free 'city of the future' in Shenzhen. Net City, which will be the same size as Monaco, covers 2 million square meters and gives priority to pedestrians, green spaces and self-driving vehicles. This 'city within a city' will rise on a piece of reclaimed land that juts out into the river estuary and will be equipped for around 80.000 inhabitants. The main goal is to create a place where innovation can flourish, according to a spokesperson for NBBJ, the American design agency behind the master plan. The design eliminates 'unnecessary' traffic and roads have also been 'removed', which will encourage people to walk more often. During that time, the idea is that they can see something inspiring, come into contact with nature or meet someone they have not seen for a while. NBBJ's master plan is designed to provide an "interconnected, human-centered organic ecosystem."
3.NEOM, Saudi Arabia
The showpiece of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. The construction of this futuristic city was announced in 2017 and should be completed in 2026. If all goes according to plan, Neom will soon have flying taxis, robot attendants and a 170-kilometer-long, 500-meter-high skyscraper called The Line, with a mirror facade on the outside. An artificial moon is also part of the project. And at NEOM Bay, glow-in-the-dark sand is sprinkled on the beaches. NEOM is part of Vision 2030: an ambitious plan to transform Saudi society. The desert state wants to reduce its dependence on oil and turn the country into a technological hub. 33 billion euros has been budgeted for the construction of this futuristic megacity, which will be 500 times larger than New York.
4.Telosa, USA
Greek philosophers called 'Telos' man's pursuit of goals in life. The goal of American billionaire and former Walmart president Marc Lore is to build the utopian city of Telosa by 2050. He is allocating $400 billion for this. The city, which architectural firm Bjarke Ingels Group will build, must house five million people. Unlike the classic model of land ownership, where land was divided up and sold to wealthy traders and entrepreneurs long ago, every resident automatically becomes a landowner. The planning is organized in such a way that residents can get to work, school or other important places within fifteen minutes from their home. This so-called 15-minute city design forms the basis of the city, which will generate its energy with sunlight, wind energy or hydropower. Whether there is water remains to be seen, because Lore has set his sights on a desert-like area in Nevada, Utah, Idaho, Arizona or Texas or the Appalachians. There are already digital animations of the city, but no final location yet.
5.Smart Kalasatama, Finland
This smart district, which is being developed in a former port area of Helsinki, should be a pioneer in the Finnish capital's climate goals and an example for the development of future smart cities. Smart mobility and a smart daily life should give residents an hour more free time every day. Smart Kalasatama is like a living laboratory where experiments will test the latest technologies and services in a real-life environment.
6.Akon City, Senegal
Akon City is a project by fifty-year-old Senegalese-American rapper Akon. For those who his name doesn't ring a bell: his second album, Convicted (2006), received a Grammy Award nomination for the single Smack That. The city named after himself must become an architectural metropolis that runs entirely on Akon's own crypto currency, the Akoin. During the introduction in 2018, he described his dream project as a 'real-life Wakanda', after the technologically advanced fictional African nation in the Marvel Universe, which is also the homeland of superhero Black Panther. Akon's assets, estimated at sixty to eighty million dollars, are far from sufficient to build an African super city. Where will he get the capital to complete the project? Despite doubts and skepticism about the viability of the project, Akon remains optimistic about the city where he will “retire and live like a king.”
7.Xiong'an, China
To relieve the burden on the metropolis of Beijing, a completely new city must be built about a hundred kilometers south of it: Xiong'an, which means 'new area'. Beijing has completely filled up and expanded to such an extent that several ring roads have now been constructed. Building a new city from scratch has the advantage that it can make a clean start in the energy field. Consider solar energy, in which China is a global leader, and hot springs to heat homes and offices. It is also possible to take into account from the drawing board how millions of people can live, work and recreate there in a pleasant way in the future. Xiong'an is a testing ground for architecture and urban development: how to design a city according to the most recent insights where ecological considerations and high-tech developments go hand in hand and where attention is paid to sustainability and the well-being of its residents? If China has its way, Xiong'an will become the blueprint of the future city and an integral part of the crucial strategy for the coming millennium.
Curious about the rest of the article? You want this edition of MASTERS. A milestone in print, pushing the boundaries. Innovative. Surprising. Stunning. Including a very extraordinary guest editor. An interview with the man who pointed out to the Ajax Supervisory Board in 2015 the gaps within the organization that have now come to light. Merijn Zeeman explains how Jumbo-Visma has developed into a top sports company. Quoteman Paul van Riessen calculates how much you need to no longer have to work. Sabine Riezebos explains what sets Bernardus apart from other golf courses. A look at the Stratos Yacht yard, where the ultimate boat for carefree sailing pleasure is being built. And also the rise of robots (where is the sex robot?), Fake News and, exclusively in MASTERS: the 'new Doutzen Kroes'.
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