‘The Drift Economy’, ‘Parking in Utopia’ and ‘Becoming Sensicle’ are just three of the dozen interactive, fun and creative activities lined up as part of the voyage of discovery which sets out to visualise - and allow people to immerse themselves in - alternative worlds.

Events will take place at Lancaster’s city centre Library and, if weather permits, in Market Square, on Wednesday, November 1 between noon and 5pm and at Lancaster University’s campus in Bailrigg (Conference Centre and Infolab) on Thursday, November 2 from 9am to noon. Further details are available here: http://www.lancaster.ac.uk/cemore/event/the-mobile-utopia-experiment/

The team would like as many people as possible (all ages) to join them in their quest to examine how people, vehicles, information, waste, resources, services, nature and ‘things’ will all move in the future.

The ‘drop-in’ experiments will precede a three-day conference at Lancaster House Hotel entitled ‘Mobile Utopia: Pasts, Presents and Futures’ which the University’s Centre for Mobilities Research (CeMore) with the support of the Institute for Social Futures is organising with the International Association for the History of Transport, Traffic and Mobility and the social scientists’ organisation, Cosmobilities Network.

Initial findings from the 12 Lancaster-based public experiments will be revealed at the start of the conference, which brings together historians, researchers, artists, policy-makers, designers and innovators.

Dr Carlos Lopez-Galviz, a lecturer in social futures at Lancaster University and one of the conference organisers, said: “We want to pool our expertise and ideas and envision alternative ‘worlds’ which take into account the role that movements play in shaping societies.

“And, just as important, we want to examine the role that changing societies play in shaping different kinds of movements, from transport and traffic through to migration, mobilities and beyond.”

Dr Lopez-Galviz added: “We are not telling people what mobilities will look like in the future. We really want local people’s views on the topics that are relevant to them.

“By taking part in the experiments we hope to learn as much as we can from people’s own ideas about their futures and the kinds of movements which they think they might be doing or might be part of in, say, three decades from now.  

“These are fun-filled experiments, inviting people to experience different things which we hope they will find engaging.”

The conference, which draws on past and present experiences, is developed in relation to Mobile Utopia 1851-2051, a project funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council.