I've suffered a wicked body blow this weekend. I've written in these pages many times of the crazy mid-career epiphany that saw my research program suddenly lurch from systematic studies of low level vision in small critters to an explosion of ideas relating to planning, architecture, design, transportation, virtual reality, new media art. I've also written (in fact this is the point of the blog) of the book that has emerged from this sudden mad change in my life's course. It isn't as if any of this was managed alone. I've had a supportive family who let me go nuts and who followed me to a tiny dot on the map in Nova Scotia to do it. I've had an indulgent university administration which has not only let me follow my strange new dreams, but has supported them both spiritually and materially. But perhaps more than anything else, I've had the friendship and encouragement of an architect named Thomas Seebohm. Thomas was a professor at the School of Architecture at the University of Waterloo who spent more than 20 years trying to blaze a trail through the emerging field of digital architecture. Using cutting edge design tools, Thomas was interested in looking into the future--seeing buildings, streetscapes and neighbourhoods emerge in pixels before there were any bricks and mortar. Finding ways to assess what worked and what didn't before any construction took place. We had known about one another for years (years I now have bitter regrets for missing out on his companionship) before we finally got into the same room together to talk. From our first meeting (a planned one hour visit which stretched to a half-day, both of us oblivious to the passage of time), we were astonished by how much two people from entirely different disciplines and backgrounds shared in common, from ideas about methodology to theory to a conviction that our efforts could make the world a better, healthier, happier place. More than anything, we agreed that the shape and appearances of spaces could exert a profound influence on human behaviour, and this influence could be used to great ends.
Thomas and I had just begun an ambitious agenda of experiments together asking questions about how people form connections with the places where they live and how these very important connections can be measured with the tools of science. In a remarkably short period of time, we'd forged proposals, won funding, attracted good students, and over the past few weeks we'd just begun to collect some fascinating data. We had enough plans together that I sometimes stayed up late at night worrying about how we could fit everything in to the few years we had left before Thomas' planned retirement.
On his annual hiatus to his mother's house in Quebec's Eastern Townships, Thomas was felled by a heart attack while riding his bicycle. He didn't survive. On the day I heard the news, I had spent many hours rambling the city with my children, visiting our farmer's market, our great parks, and some of our urban neighbourhoods. I'm growing to love this city more as I begin to understand where it came from, the issues that have shaped it, and the people who have helped to make it. What was most remarkable to me last night as I sat paralyzed by the news was how much of the day I had spent enjoying parts of the city that had developed under the steady, patient and careful gaze and attention of Thomas Seebohm. Our city has lost a visionary who told me only a few weeks ago that he felt that, for the first time in his life, the tools were now available to him to realize the dreams of his life's work.
It's hard to see how to carry on without him at the moment, but I know that I must. The dreams we had together to continue to understand, quantify and amplify the influence of built space on human behaviour using the tools of modern computing and modern psychology are just too important to die with him. I will always miss him. I only hope the work that lies ahead will honour his memory.
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