By Professor Nick Tyler

We often talk about infrastructure – these days increasingly about smart infrastructure – but how often do we pause and think about what ‘infrastructure’ is for – or what ‘smart’ is? We think about roads and railways, energy, communications and water infrastructure as serving some purpose, such as moving traffic from A to B, or supplying sufficient energy to keep the lights on, but there is a more fundamental question: why do we need to do these things? Given the amount of money (that should be) invested in infrastructure, perhaps we should be asking such a fundamental question before we start proposing what should be built. Continue reading →