We’re going to radically transform our cities — or abandon them

Whether you live on the 25th floor of a Manhattan high rise or 20 miles from your nearest neighbor in the Wyoming wilderness, chances are you’ve got a pretty clear idea of what a city is. But the cities of the past didn’t always look, feel, or function anything like the cities of the present — and there’s no guarantee the cities of the future will be recognizable, either. In fact, given the challenges facing cities around the world, many urban centers will probably undergo radical transformation or be abandoned later this century.

That, at least, is one takeaway from two excellent new books on cities and their urban residents: Four Lost Cities: A Secret History of the Urban Age by journalist and science fiction author Annalee Newitz, and Cities of Light: A Collection of Solar Futures, an anthology of short stories, essays, and artwork published by Arizona State University’s Center for Science and the Imagination. While Four Lost Cities peers deep into the history of cities and Cities of Light imagines their future, the two share a common message: Cities, like biological organisms, are in a constant state of evolution, reinventing themselves, growing in new directions, or dying out in response to both societal shifts and climate change.

Cities of Light brings together science fiction authors, visual artists, and experts in fields from political science to mechanical engineering to imagine what a solar powered future could look like for four very different U.S. cities: Chicago, Illinois; Portland, Oregon; San Juan, Puerto Rico; and San Antonio, Texas. While it’s easy to envision the clean energy-powered cities of the future looking pretty similar to those of the present but with more rooftop solar panels, offshore wind turbines, and electric vehicle charging stations, Cities of Light digs deep into the “irreducible complexities of transitioning our cities away from carbon intensive fossil fuels” as the anthology’s introduction puts it. This approach helps readers to vividly imagine how the lives of urban residents might be restructured in order to live off the Sun.