At the VicWater 2025 Annual Conference, futurist Lucinda Hartley posed a deceptively simple question: Who is the future citizen? It is, she argued, not an abstract idea. Cities are human spaces, shaped by behaviours, lifestyles, and expectations. Too often, planners envision technology-driven skylines but overlook the people who will inhabit them.
Drawing on her background in architecture and entrepreneurship, Hartley reminded delegates that plans often fail because they are overconfident projections of the past. She cited research showing that less than one per cent of major infrastructure projects are delivered on time and on budget, largely due to regulatory shifts, stakeholder complexity, and optimism bias. Yet, she stressed, these obstacles are not insurmountable: “The technology isn’t the problem. It’s the systems and rules that slow us down.”
For the water sector, understanding the next generation is critical. Gen Z, now entering the workforce in large numbers, is the most educated and digitally native generation in history. Many will not stay in one career but move across industries, often as entrepreneurs. This mobility, combined with AI-driven disruption, means utilities must rethink their approach to attracting and retaining talent.
Technology, Hartley warned, is advancing at an exponential rate. AI is no longer an experiment: it is embedded across work and life, demanding new responses from infrastructure and services. For water utilities, she made the striking point that “AI doesn’t exist without huge volumes of water to cool the data centres,” positioning the sector as foundational to the new economy.
Yet her strongest insights were about people, not machines. She described the health risks of urban loneliness, noting that weak social ties, such as chats on public transport or bumping into neighbours, are just as essential to wellbeing as strong family connections. Designing cities that enable these “weak bonds” could extend lifespans as much as medical advances.
Practical strategies also emerged, including young voices in long-term planning, utilising behavioural data alongside community surveys, and experimenting with low-risk pilots before committing to costly projects. In Point Cook, for instance, a temporary street closure transformed a struggling retail strip into a thriving hub, resulting in a 300 per cent increase in visitor spending.
Hartley’s closing message to VicWater 2025 delegates was both pragmatic and hopeful. The future is uncertain, but standing still is not an option. With entrepreneurial mindsets, data-driven insights, and a focus on people, utilities and cities alike can shape futures worth living in.