The Next Urban Infrastructure. From Roads to Roots

Cities have always been described through what we see.

Buildings. Skylines. Architecture.

But cities are not shaped by what we see.

They are shaped by what makes them possible.

Infrastructure has always been the invisible force behind urban life. It determines how cities grow, how they expand, how they connect, and how they function. Each historical era has been defined by a dominant system—one that quietly reorganized space, movement, and society itself.

Today, we are once again at a turning point.

Not because cities need better design.

But because they need a different infrastructure.

What follows is not a history of cities.

It is a history of the systems that made them—and a reflection on what comes next.

Cities Are Built on Systems

Cities are often described through their architecture. Skylines, monuments, iconic buildings. We use them as symbols, as shorthand, as identity. But if you look more closely, buildings have never really shaped cities. They sit within something larger, something deeper, something that precedes them.

Cities are not designed through objects. They are enabled by systems.

And those systems are infrastructural.

Every era has had its own dominant infrastructure. Not just as a technical layer, but as a force that defines how cities grow, how people move, how space is organized, and ultimately how life unfolds within them. If we read the history of cities through this lens, a pattern emerges.

Urban form is not the result of aesthetic choices. It is the consequence of infrastructural logic.

Rome: Infrastructure as Power

The Roman city was not simply an accumulation of buildings. It was an engineered system.

Roads extended across territories, stitching together distant geographies into a single operational field. Aqueducts carried water across kilometers, making urban life possible at a scale that would have otherwise been unthinkable.

These were not services added to the city. They were the very condition of its existence.

Infrastructure was power.

The city followed infrastructure, not the other way around.

The Medieval City: Infrastructure as Protection

With the collapse of the Roman system, the logic changed.

The medieval city turned inward. Infrastructure was no longer about expansion or connection, but about protection. Walls, gates, defensive structures defined the limits of urban life.

The city became compact, dense, enclosed.

Its form was not driven by efficiency, but by fear.

Infrastructure, once a tool of openness, became an instrument of control and survival. And once again, it was not architecture that defined the city, but the system that contained it.

The Industrial Shift: Infrastructure as Speed

The industrial revolution introduced a new force into the city: speed.

The railway redefined distance. For the first time, movement accelerated beyond the natural scale of urban life. People, goods, resources could travel faster than the city itself.

Cities expanded along tracks. They stretched, fragmented, multiplied.

Suburbs emerged. Commuting became normal. The city was no longer a bounded entity—it became a network.

Infrastructure was no longer static. It was directional.

And the city began to follow lines.

The 20th Century: Infrastructure as Flow

Then came the automobile.

Roads widened. Highways cut through neighborhoods. Entire urban fabrics were reorganized around speed, access, and flow. The city was redesigned not for people, but for vehicles.

What had once been a space of encounter became a system of circulation.

Infrastructure did not just support the city—it overtook it.

And in doing so, it redefined priorities. Distance increased. Public space shrank. The scale of the city shifted from human to mechanical.

The Correction That Didn’t Change the System

When the consequences became evident—congestion, pollution, fragmentation—we tried to fix the problem.

We built metros. Underground networks. Peripheral parking systems. We pedestrianized centers. We restricted traffic.

We moved the problem.

But we didn’t change the system.

Mobility remained the primary driver. The city was still organized around movement, even when that movement was hidden below ground.

This was not a transformation. It was an adjustment.

The Illusion of Green

Today, the language has changed.

We speak about sustainability. About green cities. About resilience. Trees are planted. Parks are designed. Green roofs appear in renderings and masterplans.

But in many cases, nothing fundamental has shifted.

Nature is still treated as an element to be inserted, not as a system to be built upon.

A tree is placed where space is available, not where it can grow. Soil is compacted, sealed, interrupted. Water is drained as quickly as possible. Time—the most essential dimension of any living system—is ignored entirely.

What we call green often remains superficial.

A layer, not a structure.

The Next Infrastructure

If we follow the historical trajectory, the conclusion becomes clear.

We are not facing a design problem.

We are facing an infrastructural transition.

The next urban infrastructure is ecological.

Not as decoration. Not as mitigation. Not as an afterthought.

But as the primary system that shapes the city.

Soil becomes continuous, deep, connected.

Water becomes visible, active, integrated.

Trees become spatial systems, not objects.

Time becomes part of the project.

This is not about adding nature to the city.

It is about building the city on nature.

A Different Urban Form

This shift is not aesthetic. It is structural.

Street sections are no longer defined by lanes and sidewalks, but by soil depth, water flows, root volumes, and canopy layers. Density is no longer measured only in built form, but in ecological capacity. Mobility is no longer about maximizing speed, but about balancing flows within a living environment.

The city is no longer an inert platform.

It becomes an active system.

And once again, infrastructure leads.

When Infrastructure Changes, Cities Transform

History makes this clear.

Roads produced empires.

Walls produced enclaves.

Railways produced networks.

Highways produced sprawl.

Ecological infrastructure will produce something else.

A different kind of city.

Not greener.

Not more sustainable.

But fundamentally restructured.

Because when infrastructure changes, cities do not adapt.

They transform.

Closing

This shift is already beginning.

Not in masterplans.

Not in renderings.

But in the growing tension between the systems we have built and the environments we actually need.

We are still designing cities as if infrastructure were inert.

But the next infrastructure is alive.

And it requires a different way of thinking.

Not about adding green,

but about redesigning the ground itself.

Not about placing trees,

but about building the conditions for them to grow.

Not about sustainability as a label,

but as a structural transformation.

This is not a new aesthetic.

It is a new foundation.

And if we are serious about changing our cities,

we need to stop asking how to make them greener,

and start asking what they are built on.

This is the question at the core of my work—and of my book,

Urban Nature Is Not a Decoration.

Because nature, in the city, is not something we add.

It is something we build upon.

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