Communities of the Twenty-first Century likely will take

Communities of the Twenty-first Century likely will take the form of compact, pedestrian-oriented villages wired with high-tech communications, according to a recent Los Angeles Times article. Writer David Bloom makes the link between the New Urbanism and what he calls “digital artisans” working out of their homes. He quotes William Mitchell, dean of MIT’s school of architecture and planning and author of City of Bits: Space, Place, and the Infobahn. “We shall see the reinvention of the preindustrial home, where the merchant lived above the shop. Neighborhoods will be densely intermingled urban space. The postindustrial city will reinvent some of the focus of the preindustrial.” Bloom cites new urbanist projects like Liberty in Lake Elsinore, California, and Playa Vista in Los Angeles, as examples of mixing neotraditional design and high-tech.