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Re:Google's 'secret' smart city on Toronto's waterfront spar... by nashashmi on Saturday March 24, 2018 @10:40AM (#16666788)
Seeing the rest of the comments to this post makes me want to set the opinion straight here and answer the question.

Sidewalk labs is not constructing. They are not consulting for anybody. They are not designing a city. They don't want to take any liability for anything.

So the only thing they are doing is being a think tank, sort of an imagination company. They identified a site for development that could play host to their ideas. And now they want others to participate in their idea. City of Toronto is one. Their role is to establish policies. Developer will be two. Their role is to establish an overall design. Consulting firm is three. Their role is to create a design. Construction firm is the fourth piece. Sidewalk Labs will facilitate the process.

The rest is a blur like financing, market, economic incentive, actual policies versus urging versus encouragement.

They will figure it out eventually.

Re:Google's 'secret' smart city on Toronto's waterfront spar... by naasking on Saturday March 24, 2018 @11:56AM (#16667231)
> Sidewalk labs is not constructing. They are not consulting for anybody. They are not designing a city. They don't want to take any liability for anything.

I'm not sure that's entirely accurate. They say they will create some core infrastructure, including internet and power at the very least. They likely aren't constructing it themselves, but they are probably financing and overseeing this core piece.