The Pop-up City: A Proposal For Augmented Reality As a New Urban Layer

Hanieh Khaleghian
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“I think the massive doses of Videodrome signal will ultimately create a new outgrowth which will produce and control hallucination to the point that it will change human reality. Television is reality, and reality is less than television.”

Dr. Brian Oblivion- Videodrome movie


This article first provides an overview of augmented-reality (AR) technology, its definition, and the concept of augmented space in urban environments. It then examines how augmented space can add new functional layers to the physical city. Finally, it introduces a futuristic vision of the Pop-Up City, imagining a bright future for this augmented urban environment.

Introduction
In the era of planetary-scale computation, the concept of space is evolving rapidly. The internet’s arrival in the 1980s and the public release of the World Wide Web in 1991 radically altered our perception of the world. Social media and digital devices have since blurred the boundary between physical and digital space. During the global pandemic, virtual space became the new normal, further eroding that boundary.

AR is a cutting-edge technology that blends physical and virtual spaces. In The Master Key, Frank Baum predicted such a device—a design-fiction prototype mapping data onto whatever its wearer sees. Nearly a century later, Boeing researcher Tom Caudell coined the term augmented reality for eyeglasses that annotated factory workers’ vision (Ramos et al., 2018).

That was the beginning of overlaying physical space with virtual data, information, and imagery to create augmented space. Lev Manovich defines augmented space as “physical space overlaid with dynamically changing information, multimedia in form, localized for each user” (Manovich, 2005). This can produce a hyper-real urban environment that may become a future urban strategy (Landi, 2019).

The sections that follow define AR and augmented space, explore how AR can function in different domains, and argue that layering digital content onto the city can transform it into a multilayered, malleable construct we call the Pop-Up City.

Augmented Reality
AR adds computer-generated layers to the physical world, producing an enhanced, interactive vision of reality (Ramos et al., 2018). Azuma describes AR systems as those that “combine real and virtual, interact in real time, and are registered in 3D,” achieved through mobile devices, monitor-based interfaces, or head-mounted displays (Azuma et al., 2001).

Milgram and Kishino’s (1994) reality–virtuality continuum places AR midway between the real and virtual worlds: it mixes reality with virtual content via smartphones, head-mounted displays, holographic lenses, or smart glasses such as HoloLens, Magic Leap One, and Google Glass (Çöltekin et al., 2020).

Today, AR is widely accessible via smartphones and tablets, yet these devices only hint at its potential. Effective AR requires immersion (a compelling illusion of reality) and presence (the feeling of “being there”) (Çöltekin et al., 2020). By eliciting both, AR collapses virtual space onto physical space and reshapes our understanding of the urban environment.

Augmented Urban Space
In our tech-oriented world, space, place, and location intersect. “Space” is a social construct emerging from people’s experiences; “location” is a place’s geographic aspect. Mobile technologies and location-based services have tightened the link between physical space and cyberspace (Sanaeipoor & Emami, n.d.).

Manovich’s augmented space combines augmented reality and “cellspace” (physical space filled with retrievable data) to describe a physical realm overlaid with dynamic, localized information (Manovich, 2005; Kong, 2016). Such augmentation can redefine urban perception (Kong, 2016). With their interactive layers, digital overlays offer new ways to move through, annotate, and enact urban areas (Liao & Humphreys, 2015), mediating everyday life.

Spatial sociologist Dieter Läpple argues that urban space has four social dimensions: physical, social, regulatory, and semiotic. AR adds a fifth layer (Nestler et al., 2019). This layer comprises multiple digital sublayers that can transform our experience of the city. The next sections examine four such sublayers: navigational, artistic, game, and historical.

Navigational Sublayer
Tracking ties the digital layer to the physical: marker-based, markerless, and location-based AR (Nestler et al., 2019). Location-based AR (a subset of LBS) anchors overlays to specific sites (Liao & Humphreys, 2015) to improve wayfinding. Google Maps’ Live View overlays arrows on streets; Yelp’s Monocle tags restaurants; Cadillac’s Lyriq HUD projects navigation cues into the driver’s sightline.

Artistic Sublayer
AR delivers virtual public art. Artists layer 3D models, animation, and typography over existing street art or urban infrastructure (Gwilt, 2018). Snapchat’s collaboration with Jeff Koons placed a virtual Balloon Dog in Central Park; artist Sebastian Errazuriz “vandalized” it digitally to critique corporate occupation of public AR space. AR also enables low-cost activist art. In 2011 Mark Skwarek launched #arOCCUPYWALLSTREET, letting remote participants overlay protest messages onto New York’s financial district (Skwarek, 2018).

Game Sublayer
AR games turn cities into playgrounds—Pokémon Go, Ingress, and Zombies, Run! encourage players to roam parks, landmarks, and streets (Potts et al., 2017). Ingress links portals (real-world objects) into contested fields, fostering exploration and collaboration. Minecraft Earth lets players co-build virtual structures tied to physical sites.

Historical Sublayer
AR can archive history in situ, layering narratives onto their original locations. Alexandre Devaux’s Hololens project lets viewers walk through Paris streets as they looked a century ago. AR also surfaces suppressed histories: John Craig Freeman projected an image of Neda Agha-Soltan over Tehran’s Azadi Tower to memorialize her death during the 2009 protests.

Pop-Up City: A Future Vision
Given current tech trends, AR may soon become ubiquitous, merging digital reality with the physical city. Citizens wearing head-mounted or implanted devices could select from overlapping digital layers—offered by municipalities, institutions, or individuals—to explore, play, and imagine. Yet risks loom: intrusive ads, surveillance, cybercrime. Designers, urbanists, and policymakers must collaborate to safeguard this inclusive vision. If they succeed, the Pop-Up City could become an equitable, imaginative homeland for all.

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