This colloquium will discuss the impact of emerging digital and self-aware technologies on personal and
transportation choices and our interaction with the public realm. It will specifically look at notions of emergent nodes in the urban fabric where development naturally emerges in response to socially active “hot-spots” triggered by the dynamics in physical space, transportation capacity, and the swing of social network demands. Featuring experts from academic institutions, the colloquium will present new technologies, problem solving methods, and innovative solutions for transportation infrastructure as well as distributed modes of transport that synthesizes personal communications, emergent nodes, autonomous social spaces, and the notion of a self-aware urban space to create a different way of thinking about how transportation systems can overlay and connect to existing systems present in the reality of a poly-centric metropolitan area such as the San Francisco Bay Area.