Labs has already begun replacing payphones in New York with wifi kiosks

Project would 'think about a city from the Internet up'

Alphabet, Google's parent company, is considering building an entire city from scratch.

The boss of Sidewalk Labs, the firm's New York City firm described as an 'urban innovation' company mentioned the idea at a summit hosted by The Information.

'Thinking about a city from the Internet up is really compelling,' Sidewalk CEO Dan Doctoroff said at the event.

The boss of Sidewalk Labs, Alphabet's 'urban innovation' company mentioned the idea at a summit hosted by tech website The Information.

SIDEWALK PROJECTS So far the firm has worked on two projects: LinkNYC, which replaces public pay phones with a network of 7,500 data and communication hubs throughout New York City. The kiosks are being provided by a franchise agreement between NYC and CityBridge, a consortium of companies that includes Qualcomm, CIVIQ Smartscapes, and Intersection which is owned by a group of investors led by Sidewalk Labs. The kiosks will deliver to residents and visitors free gigabit Wi-Fi, video and voice calling, and access to emergency and other city services. Flow, a project to improve traffic in cities, is being built with the U.S. Department of Transportation as part of its Smart City Challenge. It will be a transportation coordination platform that uses analytics and messaging to help cities work with citizens to increase the efficiency of road, parking, and transit use, improving access to mobility for all. Advertisement

Later he added that building a new city could help test solutions to cybersecurity and privacy issues: 'If you could create a place, it'd be a laboratory to experiment with these problems.'

Developing a city 'would be a great idea,' he said, before quickly adding 'I can't tell you anything' in a conversation with the site's Jessica Lessin.

'Cities are hard,' he said.

'You have people with vested interest, politics, physical space...But the technology ultimately cannot be stopped.'

'A lot of people have tried it and haven't succeeded.

'Right now we're just building products and services but there are lots of lessons that can be learned from the past and we'll see what happens over time,'

The subsidiary was launched last year with a mission to develop technology that makes living and running big cities better.

'Sidewalk will focus on improving city life for everyone by developing and incubating urban technologies to address issues like cost of living, efficient transportation and energy usage,' chief executive Larry Page said in a post at the Internet titan's Google+ social network.

It is headed by Dan Doctoroff, a former chief executive of Bloomberg LP and New York city deputy mayor of economic development under then Mayor Michael Bloomberg.

'We are at the beginning of a historic transformation in cities,' Doctoroff said in a release when the organisation first formed.

'We hope that Sidewalk will play a major role in developing technology products, platforms and advanced infrastructure that can be implemented at scale in cities around the world.'

Free Wi-Fi kiosks with New York City's LinkNYC program were launched Thursday. Mayor Bill de Blasio is seen Thursday at the launch event

While financial details were not disclosed, Page described Sidewalk as a 'relatively modest investment' in building a business that is not only different from Google's core Internet operations but which could improve people's lives.

He put Sidewalk on par with Google (x) lab headed by Google co-founder Sergey Brin, and known for 'moonshots' like self-driving cars.

'Making long-term, 10X bets like this is hard for most companies to do, but Sergey and I have always believed that it's important,' Page said in his Google+ post.

'And as more and more people around the world live, work and settle in cities, the opportunities for improving urban environments are endless.'

So far the firm has worked on NYCLink, and Flow, a project to improve traffic in cities.

Mayor Bill de Blasio was filmed telling reporters at a news conference: 'LinkNYC will be the Wi-Fi network New York City deserves.

'It will be the biggest and fastest network in the world - and completely free of charge.

'And one thing I know about my fellow New Yorkers: they like things that are completely free of charge, so this is going to be very popular.'

The mayor's office said in a news release: 'These kiosks, called 'Links,' will provide New Yorkers with an incredibly fast, secure and private Wi-Fi network with a 150-foot radius, free domestic calling, two USB charging ports, a tablet for accessing the internet, and a red 911 button to contact emergency services.