• A study from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology reveals that pedestrians in three major northeastern U.S. cities—Boston, New York and Philadelphia—are moving 15 percent faster than they did in 1980. They also found that fewer people are lingering in public spaces, with the number dropping by 14 percent over the past three decades.
• Co-author Arianna Salazar-Miranda
• implications not just for social cohesion, but also for cities' ability to generate informal encounters that drive creativity, civic engagement and community.
• social life may not have disappeared; it may just be happening elsewhere
• Private venues tend to attract more homogenous groups, so there are fewer chances to encounter people from different walks of life.
• Ruth Conroy Dalton, a professor of architecture at Northumbria University in the U.K
• Carlo Ratti, MIT professor
• Dalton, who was not involved in the MIT-led research, pointed to a national survey she co-authored
• In 2010, a research team led by sociologist Keith Hampton recreated Whyte's filming conditions, shooting updated footage from the same locations at the same time of day.
• William H. Whyte's groundbreaking work in the 1970s
• findings was a drop in the number of people who joined groups after entering public spaces.
• rise of smartphones, which allow people to coordinate plans digitally before stepping outside
• "It was a place you could start a conversation or run into a friend. You couldn't do things online then."
• Coffee culture may also be playing a role, drawing people away from sidewalks and into climate-controlled, Wi-Fi-equipped venues
• will inform how cities design and redesign public areas—especially at a time when digital polarization is reshaping how people connect in real life

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