You Can’t Fight City Hall. But Maybe You Can Fight Google.

Sidewalk, founded by Google in 2015 to develop technologies to improve urban life, won the first round of the contest. Its idea was to create a so-called city of the future that would marry technological innovation to shape urban planning and design.

High-rises made from engineered wood would replace weed lots and underused warehouses along streets. Bike paths would melt snow. Giant awnings would shelter pedestrians from rain or blazing summer sun. Sensors would track residents’ every movement to optimize everything from traffic signals to underground armies of robots delivering parcels and discarding trash.

And all of it would meet ambitious environmental standards.

Critics pounced. How would Sidewalk use the data it gathered from the streets, washrooms and even the garbage bins, they asked. Who would own the data? How would it be stored?

Several people, including Mr. Balsillie, rejected Sidewalk’s fundamental premise that algorithms, rather than politics, are the best way to design and run a city. And some argued that the project appeared to be a means of promoting concepts such as self-driving cars and other interests of Google, which, like Sidewalk, is a subsidiary of Alphabet.

“This is about corporate capture of governance and privatizing governments,” said Bianca Wylie, who has long pushed for citizen access to data and who co-founded Block Sidewalk, the largest group opposing the plan.

Sidewalk, she said, has “wonderfully intelligent people working there, and they care about cities.”

But, Ms. Wylie added, “The problem is that nobody gets to buy democracy and governance.”

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/10/world/canada/toronto-sidewalk-labs-google.html