By 2050, the world’s population is expected to rocket as high as 9.7 billion people with at least two to five billion living in urban areas. What this means for our current cities is that there would have to be a lot of revamping to create infrastructures better suited for the future to help sustain human and economic activities. Historically, urbanisation has been a crucial determining factor for economic growth and development. With over 50% of the current world population spread across urban settlements, it can be accepted that urbanisation would be instrumental for a prosperous economy in the future. Civil engineers, therefore, become integral players in reinventing city designs to take on the future of our society as more people migrate to the urban areas.
With the increasing influx of people into urban civilisation, the importance of cities with carefully thought out urban designs to accommodate the masses while still ensuring the environment’s safety has been of significant interest. Just as important is its slow pace of adoption which is made evident through congested, polluted cities. The right set of policies and a solid financial plan in place has helped to harness the dense population of today’s cities to provide more value and revenue, mainly through agglomeration economies to improve economic performance.
In an era of neuro-architecture, there has been a proven relationship between city designs and the state of our wellbeing. City designers, therefore, believe that this would the building block on which cities of the future would be designed, having our state of mind at heart. The future of our cities is well placed in the hands of our civil engineers as key players in tackling the challenges facing future cities. Innovations to improve infrastructure and optimisation of resources to create better-designed cities well suited to fuel economic growth as well as improve lifestyle, therefore, becomes a task to be tackled by engineers for the future. Already, there have been new approaches taken such as is seen in helping London boroughs develop electric charging infrastructure.
This shift aims to reduce vehicular emissions and to improve air quality. Over time, engineers have helped develop solutions to most physical problems society faces, from transport networks to waste management and even digital infrastructure which are an important part of urban life and essential tools for productivity and efficiency. It is therefore imperative that by 2050, civil engineers would create a lasting impact through development of better-designed cities to help boost economic growth, saving the society billions of dollars and fueling overall strategies to building happier and healthier cities. Indications point to the fact that as much as £15.3 Billioncould be saved by the year 2050.
While the society progresses towards becoming more efficient and healthier, owing to the fact of how this would positively affect the economy, civil engineers will play a tectonic role in both the development and design of futuristic cities. Having better-designed cities with proper infrastructure, technology, as well as policies, would without doubt, transform the state of the economy as well as its residents at large while still adapting to the society’s future necessities.
