Bristol to become a Playable City

Bristol is to be transformed into a playable city this summer, with a project known as Hello Lamp Post! Players will use the unique identifying codes on every lamp post, post box, and other publicly-maintained street furniture to talk to the city.

Hello Lamp Post! invites audiences to tune in to the secret conversations of the city and communicate through lamp posts, bus stops, post boxes and other street furniture. Part game, part story, anyone can play by texting in a unique code found on the city’s familiar street objects.

Lamp posts, bus stops and post boxes are the goosebumps of the city and so ubiquitous that they have become invisible. The ‘smart city’ approach is to augment them with technologies like digital displays, but Hello Lamp Post! seeks instead to make them playable, using existing city infrastructure to make an open, hospitable and playful experience which encourages people to notice and interact with what is around them.

Every post box in Bristol has a six figure code, every bollard has two, some of the benches have seven and the storm drains have 14. This summer you will be invited to text the word ‘Hello + the name of the object + its code’ to the special phone number and the item of street furniture will immediately text you back with a question.

Will it be pleased to see you? Irritated at having been left in the rain? Or will it tell you a secret? The more you play, the more the hidden life of the city will be revealed.

I really hope some of those objects are feelin’ groovy. You can get more info on the Playable City website.