SMLXL: Scaling the smart city, from metropolis to individual

Drawing on the outcomes of a university studio, this article rethinks the smart city as a series of urban scales-metropolis, community, individual, and personal-and proposes an analytical model for classifying smart city initiatives in terms of engagement. Informed by the theory of proxemics, the model proposed analyses smart city initiatives in terms of the scope of their features and audience size; the actors accountable for their deployment and maintenance; their spatial reach; and the ability of design solutions to re-shape and adapt to different urban scenarios and precincts. We argue that the significance of this model lies in its potential to facilitate modes of thinking across and between scales in ways that can gauge the levels of involvement in the design of digitally mediated urban environments, and productively re-situate citizens as central to the design of smart city initiatives.