FUTURE FACING

COURTESY OF LAKE NONA STEVEN MADOW

Tomorrowland is more than just a section of Walt Disney World. It’s becoming real, right in Orlando, which has plans in place to be a “future-ready city”—one that uses stakeholder involvement, innovation, and technology to create a thriving and vibrant community of tomorrow. What makes Orlando primed to become a future-ready city? According to Michael Hess, director of Future Ready for the City of Orlando, the answer starts with planning and community. “We are one of the only places that has created an overall future-ready smart city plan,” he says. “We’ve taken a step back and looked at this holistically, engaging the community and really thinking about what issues they want us to solve as a future-ready city, as opposed to just shiny objects.”

PLANNING FOR SUCCESS

The city started the phased-in approach to the future-ready plan in late 2019 with internal in-depth interviews with all of the city departments, asking them what they thought a smart city or future city should be. “We wanted to understand from them some of the things they were already doing,” Hess says. They moved forward with focus group discussions with city staff and community stakeholders, where they brainstormed ideas.

Next came public workshops for each of the city’s six districts. “We had really great turnout, so we were getting direct feedback from the community,” Hess says. Held in February and March of 2020, the last public workshop took place just as everything was shutting down due to COVID-19, so Hess says they set up virtual workshops to show the community how the plan was progressing, enabling them to extend community engagement.

W h i l e t h e p a n d e m i c h a s s l o w e d p r o j e c t s d o w n , t h e c i t y w a s a b l e t o f i n i s h t h e m a s t e r p l a n , w h i c h i s a v a i l a b l e o n l i n e (orlando.gov/our-government/future-ready-city) in the virtual “meeting room.”

The future-ready master plan is organized around seven focus areas—connectivity, energy, health and safety, materials, mobility, placemaking, and water—which categorized major services already provided by the city and its partners. Along with those pillars, a list of foundational elements will guide the plan’s implementation, including people first, diversity, sustainability, prosperity for all, transparency, and security. According to Hess, every plan is assessed through these foundational elements. “Every project we do, we’re thinking about those foundation elements, and actually we use those to help pick what projects we want to do,” he says.

To kick things off, Orlando will roll out a hot spot and tablet check-out program, giving residents the opportunity to rent equipment at designated community centers. “We have goals around bridging the digital divide,” Hess says. “One of the issues is that people have lost their jobs during the pandemic, and now that everything has gone online, they may not be

Inset: The Creative Village neighborhood offers ample opportunities to live, work, and learn. Opposite page: From its autonomous shuttles to its tech-centric shared spaces, Lake Nona is a “smart city with a soul.”

COURTESY OF LAKE NONA SCOTT COOK PHOTOGRAPHY

able to pay their internet bill. We’re trying to provide these resources so people can check out a tablet from one of our community centers. That tablet has cellular data, and it actually is going to have resources on it to help with job searches.”

Bridging the digital divide is critical to making a future-ready city equitable for everyone. Hess refers back to the foundational elements to explain. “One of them is prosperity for all. One is resilience. One is people first. To me they all point to equity and having an equitable city. When I personally think about technology, new technology is a way to continue to divide the haves from the have nots, but it’s also an opportunity to bring everyone up, create equity, and [provide] everyone access to information and technology. We’re going to continue to separate economically if there are people who don’t have access to the internet.” The city is also working with computer students at Valencia College to empower them to start a new product to help better define the digital divide.

Lake Nona is home to high-tech artworks such as The Beacon (above left), communal areas like Boxi Park (above right and below), and innovative work spaces such as Pixon MS2 (inset).

Of course, new technology and innovation can lead to job losses as certain skills become automated. Like everything, Orlando has a plan for that. “One of the overarching goals is around workforce development,” Hess says. “Anytime we put out one of these future-ready projects, we’re really trying to have some form of workforce development in it, to really involve the community, particularly in this current climate. I’m actually a believer that technology is going to eliminate some jobs, but I think it’s going to create more. Anytime we roll out a program that has a workforce development component, I think it’s really going to help with that issue.” Going forward, Hess believes that Orlando can be a model for other cities hoping to become future-ready, but not necessarily because of the end result. “I really hope that everyone looks at our process and not necessarily our results or the projects that we pick,” he says. “There are different priorities in Colorado than in Florida. So, to me, I really hope the example that we set is that other communities will go through that community engagement process and not just think about doing technology at the beginning, but actually go to the community and ask them, ‘What do you want to solve? What do we need to get better at?’ And

SCOTT COOK PHOTOGRAPHY

©UNIVERSITY OF CENTRAL FLORIDA

©UNIVERSITY OF CENTRAL FLORIDA

Clockwise from above: Students at UCF Downtown; Move Nona autonomous shuttle; UnionWest student resident community at Creative Village.

if there is a technology solution that helps with that, great, or if there’s a low-tech or no-tech solution, great. That’s what’s most important to me, defining what smart city or future-ready means to your community first.

FORWARD-LOOKING LIVING

COURTESY OF LAKE NONA

Live-work-play developments are coming together in the Orlando area, offering amenities for all types of residents.

For more urban living, the Creative Village is transforming the former site of the Amway Arena in downtown Orlando into a 68-acre, mixed-use, transit-oriented infill neighborhood that will be home to leading higher-education providers, high-tech digital media, and creative companies. The neighborhood is a public/private partnership between the City of Orlando and Creative Village Development LLC, a joint venture between Ustler Development Inc. and Banc of America Community Development Corporation.

The new University of Central Florida (UCF) Downtown and Valencia College Downtown campuses opened in Creative Village in August 2019, and big-name creative companies are moving in, starting with Electronic Arts (EA), which is relocating its Maitland, Florida, headquarters to Creative Village. A leading video gaming company and a global powerhouse in digital interactive entertainment, EA is expected to move into a new 175,940-square-foot space.

T h e J u l i a n , t h e f i r s t a p a r t m e n t p r o j e c t i n C r e a t i v e V i l l a g e , o p e n e d i n J u l y 2 0 2 0 . T h e 1 4 - s t o r y b u i l d i n g f e a t u r e s 4 0 9 c o n t e m p o r a r y r e s i d e n c e s a n d 6 , 0 0 0 s q u a r e f e e t o f g r o u n d - f l o o r c o m m e r c i a l s p a c e . W h e n i t i s f u l l y c o m p l e t e i n 2 0 2 2 , t h e J u l i a n w i l l i n c l u d e 3 5 0 , 0 0 0 s q u a r e f e e t o f a c a d e m i c s p a c e f o r U C F D o w n t o w n a n d V a l e n c i a C o l l e g e , m o r e t h a n 9 5 0 a p a r t m e n t s , 6 4 0 s t u d e n t h o u s i n g b e d s , 1 7 5 , 0 0 0 s q u a r e f e e t o f p r o f e s s i o n a l o f f i c s p a c e , a 2 . 5 - a c r e p u b l i c p a r k , a M a r r i o t t h o t e l , a n d t h e A C E

S c h o o l , w h i c h w i l l s e r v e 1 , 0 0 0 s t u d e n t s i n p r e - K t h r o u g h e i g h t h g r a d e .

Nearby Lake Nona is hyped as “a smart city with soul.” The 17-square-mile master-planned community developed by

Tavistock Development Company prioritizes forward-thinking technology, strategic partnerships, education, and well-being in a vibrant live-work-play environment.

Health and wellness are a major focus for Lake Nona residents.

Home designs include single-family, multifamily, and seniorspecific neighborhoods, and Lake Nona also boasts its own Medical

City, which includes the Orlando VA Medical Center, Nemours

Children’s Hospital, MD Anderson Orlando Cancer Research

Institute, and the UCF Lake Nona Medical Center. Residents can participate in the groundbreaking Lake Nona Life Project, a long-term health study designed to examine patterns, predictors, and strategies of lifestyle behaviors that may optimize lifelong wellness.

But Lake Nona is also harnessing the power of technology for its

COURTESY OF THE CITY OF ORLANDO

Leading video game developer EA will open a new East Coast headquarters in downtown Orlando.

German Aviation company Lilium (below right) will bring its Lilium Jet air taxi (inset) to Central Florida. Other industry leaders such as Verizon are also flocking to the area, to include a Verizon 5G Innovation Hub in Lake Nona (below).

COURTESY OF LILIUM

COURTESY OF LAKE NONA

residents, having announced an agreement with Verizon in early 2020 to bring new technologies (including 5G) to the area. The Verizon 5G Innovation Hub will operate in a shared space with the leAD 2 Lake Nona Sports & Health Tech Accelerator in the new Pixon MS collaborative environment. The leAD accelerator will focus on “future of living” solutions in three areas—sports and health tech, smart cities, and the future of nutrition—driving growth for entrepreneurs through investment and mentorship in an environment that will allow participants to conceive, test, and implement their ideas during a sixmonth program.

TRANSPORTATION TRENDS

George Jetson’s space car is on its way to becoming a reality with a fleet of all-electric vertical take-off and landing (eVTOL) jet aircraft being developed by Lilium. The Munich-based aviation company has partnered with Tavistock and the City of Orlando to build the first U.S. “vertiport” in Lake Nona, creating the country’s first air bility network. Located adjacent to the Orlando International Airport (OIA), Lake Nona is also home to BBA Aviation/Signature Flight Support and SimCom Aviation Training, making it a natural choice for the first vertiport.

Planned to launch in 2025, the eVTOL service will enable people to travel within a 186-mile radius in the state of Florida. Still in the development stage, the five-seat aircraft (four passengers and a pilot) is designed with regional mobility in mind, saving passengers—who will be able to use the Lilium app to find the closest vertiport and plan out trips—up to 30 minutes of travel time.

“Lilium’s first location in the Florida network has been announced as Lake Nona, Orlando,” the company has stated. “Lake Nona has been described as the ‘Future of Cities,’ so it was a natural choice for Lilium to establish the first vertiport location in the U.S. and the firs outside of our home country. At its core, the community is designed to meet a higher standard of smarter, sustainable living, an ethos which closely matches that of Lilium.”

Speaking of the OIA, high-speed rail Brightline is on track to expand its service from West Palm Beach into the airport’s South Terminal in late 2022 or early 2023, creating another connection spot for visitors to easily zip into Orlando in under two hours. In November 2020, Brightline also announced it was entering an agreement with Walt Disney World to construct a train station at the Disney Springs shopping, dining, and entertainment complex, providing a convenient travel option between Walt Disney World and Brightline stations at OIA, Miami, Fort Lauderdale, and West Palm Beach.

COURTESY OF LILIUM

COURTESY OF LILIUM

Inset: The Lilium Lake Nona vertiport will be the first of its kind in the United States. Below: Luminar’s Scott Faris, Jason Eichenholz, and Austin Russell are leading its efforts in Orlando to create autonomous vehicle sensors and software.

COURTESY OF LUMINAR

INVITING INNOVATION

When it comes to innovation, University of Central Florida is a focal point for development areas such as the Central Florida Research Park and Creative Village. One of the country’s largest technical universities, UCF was founded in 1963 to provide talent for the region and the growing U.S. space program. Today UCF has 13 colleges and more than 230 degree programs, including optics and lasers, modeling and simulation, engineering and computer science, and video game design. So, it’s no surprise that companies with an eye toward the future are moving to Orlando to take advantage of the talent and research programs UCF has to offer.

Adjacent to UCF, the Central Florida Research Park is home to the headquarters of Luminar, an autonomous vehicle sensor company co-founded by Austin Russell and UCF graduate Jason Eichenholz, who developed the most advanced long-range, high-resolution lidar technology for selfdriving vehicles. The company boasts major partnerships, including seven of the world’s top 10 auto makers. In November 2020, Luminar became the supplier to furnish Intel’s Mobileye with lidar for its fleet of autonomous vehicles. Sensors made by the firm will start appearing on self-driving Volvos in 2022. Luminar was founded in Silicon Valley and maintains an office in Palo Alto, but the company says that Orlando is the ideal location for its headquarters. “With a strong legacy rooted in innovation and technology, Orlando’s extensive history in aerospace and defense has helped the region foster an unmatched expertise for photonics technology,” says a Luminar spokesperson. “Orlando also has the largest concentration of lidar engineers in the world, which has enabled Luminar to fin the talent necessary to work toward achieving its vision of making autonomous mobility safe and ubiquitous. Additionally, the three largest Department of Defense laser programs are based in Orlando, and the State of Florida has passed legislation to test and improve the safety of autonomous vehicles, which is crucial for Luminar as the company helps to pioneer the path to autonomy.”

While we can’t expect to see flying cars tomorrow, Orlando has established itself as a leader in development, technology, and lifestyle options as it transforms into a truly future-ready city, becoming a smart place to live, work, learn, and play under the Central Florida sun. «