For the Love of Cities by Peter Kageyama

Author:Peter Kageyama [Kageyama, Peter]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2011-03-01T05:00:00+00:00

How can cities emulate Apple? Here are a few principles:

• Design matters. If you’ve ever used an iPhone, you know that Apple lives by this principle. Their products are immediately distinguishable from every other product no matter if it is a phone, computer or MP3 player. Cities, like products, need a distinctive aesthetic identity. The “Soul of the Community” survey (explored in Ch. 1) taught us that great aesthetics is rewarded with increased affection and engagement by our citizens.

• Make it easy to use. Apple products mask their underlying complexity with simple, elegant interfaces. Apple strives to remove buttons, layers of choices and endless screens in favor of simplicity. Cities need to streamline their complexity and give citizens easier access to municipal services. Needless bureaucracy and layers of regulation have accumulated in all of our cities like sediment over time.

• Just be cool—don’t tell me you’re cool. Nothing says “I’m not cool” like someone who can’t stop talking about how hip they are. You can’t tell me that you’re a cool, hip city. (Not if you want me to believe you, anyway.) Apple manages to get its fans to tell others how cool it is. We know that Apple is incredibly self-conscious of their coolness, but they wear it with an insouciance that makes them seem beyond cool. Cities need to work on acting like that cool, hip city, and let someone else tell me how cool you are.

• Provide great customer service. If you’ve ever gone to the Genius Bar at an Apple store to get help with your computer, you have seen great customer service in action. Why can’t the city’s Department of Motor Vehicles or permitting department be like the Genius Bar? Apple and other companies that emphasize customer service recognize that a happy customer is a loyal customer. Cities too often act like they are a monopoly and that the citizen/customer has no other choice. But the very citizens that cities value most, the young, educated and entrepreneurial are the ones most able to vote with their feet and leave for a better gig.

• Little things matter, i.e., pay attention to the details. If you have ever purchased an Apple product, from an iPod to a desktop computer, you have had the experience of unwrapping and opening your purchase for the very first time. The Apple experience begins with the packaging that the product arrives in. Layered into beautifully designed boxes, opening an Apple product is akin to a “Chinese box” with precise pieces that unfold like origami. Cities would do well to remember that the experience of the city begins long before most people arrive at your city center or iconic buildings. Ask how does your city present itself for the first time for someone arriving by plane or car.

Apple pays attention to small functional elements as well. How many times have you tripped over a power cord and toppled your laptop? Most PC power cords have a plug that is inserted into the computer and if jerked, it can pull the computer off a table.

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