041 // How Infrastructure Shapes Behaviour

Featured Speaker: Shoshanna Saxe

Infrastructure seems to be everywhere in the news these days, whether its promises from politicians to rebuild crumbling roads and bridges, demands for better transit and bicycle pathways, or the new movement toward Smart Cities and connecting infrastructure in new ways. And infrastructure remains a huge investment, of both resources and of time. The decisions we make now must continue to work for years — possibly generations — to come.

Twenty-first century infrastructure needs to be sustainable, moving away from the most environmentally-intensive materials used in the past, such as concrete. It also needs to be flexible -- but what does this mean in practical terms? How can we design and build cities for the future? How do engineers plan for change when making choices about major infrastructure projects? This salon will discuss how we shape the systems that underpin our cities, and how they shape us in return.

Shoshanna is an Assistant Professor in the University of Toronto’s Department of Civil and Mineral Engineering and Canada Research Chair in Sustainable Infrastructure. She investigates the relationship between the infrastructure we build and the society we create to identify opportunities – and pathways – to better align infrastructure provision with sustainability. Her research and commentary have been featured in media outlets such as The New York Times, The Toronto Star, The Financial Post, and Wired, including “What We Really Need Are Good ‘Dumb’ Cities.”