The Road Ahead, a new Cooper Hewitt exhibition, frames conversations around equity, street design, UX, freight, and more Stand at the intersection of Fifth Avenue and 90th Street for a couple minutes and you?ll notice that, like many other New York City street corners, it?s loud. Cars and buses zoom by and horns blare. The occasional bike jockeys for space. Waves of pedestrians cross the three-lanes to enter Central Park.
That same intersection also welcomes visitors to The Road Ahead, a new exhibition on the future of mobility at the Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum, on view through March 2019. The sound engineers at ARUP created a 3D-audio installation that offers a tantalizing glimpse of what the intersection could be like in the future, if new modes of transportation featured in the exhibition?such as autonomous vehicles, scooters, and drones?become widespread. ?We don?t know what the future is going to hold,? says curator Cynthia E. Smith, who organized the exhibition with curatorial director Cara McCarty and curatorial assistant Julie Pastor. ?It could be a utopia or dystopia. It could be more congestion or less congestion. We?re trying to help people see how design can play a really important role [in the future] and understand what?s possible through design.?
As the rumble of gas engines fades, lightsaber-like whooshes of electric cars and bike bells enter into ear shot. The street narrows, and a lane of parked cars becomes a patch of greenery. Cl...