Disney subcontracted the design work for EPCOT exhibits and I designed several of them. Today, they look ridiculous, but they were futuristic then. We were still building when the Experimental City of Tomorrow concept was replaced by another Disneyland.

Those of us in the creative disciplines were left with memories of what could have been, but never would be. The Experimental City of Tomorrow concept took aim at the design of real urban environments in the future (not theme parks). Without projects like EPCOT, Americans had no beautiful possibilities to aspire to, nothing to spark their imaginations, and no reason to expect anything better in their towns and cities.

Instead of integrating rapidly developing technologies into urban planning, big corporate developers kept building their cheap, gaudy, suburbs, exurbs, and strip malls - and making a fortune.