Data driven but wabi-sabi driven, too

The get "smart" these days, city leaders usually beef themselves up with a network of sensors. They become a city of things, wired and tuned. Unfortunately, that alone doesn't make a city a nice place to be. For that, you also need wabi-sabi.

It's a Japanese thing, and like so much of Japanese culture that Westerners like, it's hard to explain.

I picked u…