Future Narrative #11 - Roots Renewed Responsibly
This story was imagined from our 2021 Data and Design lab at the University of Edinburgh. It was our first travel Tech Futures workshop and marked the emergence from pandemic lockdowns with forward thinking about the return to travel. We worked with 50 participants from Scotland and abroad in a hybrid way, all with interests in technology and travel. We used the three horizons approach to come up with the future of travel in 20-30 in 2040 and in 2050. This near future story anticipates an essential awareness of a family's carbon footprint while travelling, and the use of algorithmic data exploring to find family heritage and distant connections in Edinburgh in 2030.
Illustrated by James Albon and written by Máire Ryan.
Roots Renewed Responsibly - Illustrated by James Albon
The most remarkable thing about the Finneson abode, apart from how it always seemed like it was due a Spring clean, was their rec room. Sure, it came with all the usual gadgets required to offer gaming, viewing and relaxation: these features didn’t make it particularly remarkable. It wasn’t even the constant presence of something crunching underfoot (the youngest Finneson, Albie, had a lust for crackers which was complimented by a distaste for using kitchenware). It was the décor. Wall to wall tartan. Chairs, carpets, ceilings too. The Finnesons of West Loop, Chicago IL were of Scottish descent: loud and proud. The dad, Jim, had even gone through a phase of trying to learn the bagpipes. The mom, Isla, had put up with this hobby for about two weeks before calling time. She embraced her heritage more visually: she had flaming red hair. Her mane had caught Jim’s eye as the brightest thing in a dimly lit bar in Midtown many moons ago. On their wedding day, she’d dotted periwinkles among it: the cascading icy blues matching her eyes. The rec room was the Finnesons’ ode to their shared heritage. It was their wildest dream to plant their feet on Scottish soil. At least, before the babies came along.
Agnes first, a glaring and vocal baby. Head of the clan from day one, she ruled with an iron fist that was only softened by how much she clung to her daddy. Three years later came Albert (full name of the cracker-gorging goofball known as Albie). The alliterated children were part of the plan: Agnes a nod to a distant relative Jim had managed to trace using the more clunky ancestry software he’d purloined from a neighbour. Albie, close to Alba, the Gaelic name for Scotland. The kids were truly wild as Celts, running riots in back gardens throughout the block, their war cries raising polite complaints from more than one local on occasion. Jim didn’t help, as Isla often pointed out; a great munro who was always happy for these little wolves to traipse all over him. Both too young to understand the rec room as a clear red flag for their parents’ collective obsession, rather Agnes and Albie felt safely cocooned in the space. Albie could guarantee he’d always find something to snack on, in between sofa cushions.
When Agnes was eight and Albie reached five, a series of fateful tribulations occurred for the Finnesons. Win one: Isla got a raise at work. She worked in copywriting and, even though a great deal of her work was getting automated through the innovations of AI writing software, she offered a deeply magical–and unique–ability to weave wonders with language. Her company, keen to keep her from wandering to another business, funded her into remaining planted. Win two: Jim also got a raise at work. A digital architect, his forward-thinking lead on a particularly complex design had so delighted the customer that he perceived significant leverage to go after more. His bosses agreed, and the Finnesons moved up a bracket in their economic status. The third win was particularly fortuitous: Jim found a platform that dwarfed his clunky ancestry programme. Trinder, which specialised in authentic and eco-friendly heritage tours for curious Americans, made the old programme as useful as a stack of dusty censuses. Setting up a family profile in moments, Jim leaned back–astounded–as connection after familial connection began to blossom on the screen in front of him. As the algorithm continued to bear genetic fruit, the AI Travel Agent politely enquired as to whether Jim might like to view options for a carbon-conscious, ancestrally-focussed trip to Scotland? Jim was all in.
The four Finnesons found themselves on an eco-friendly plane with a direct flight from O’Hare to Edinburgh International. The kids were awed into silence: they’d never flown before, since their parents struggled with eco-friendly flight prices but could not bring themselves to pay the moral, planetary cost of regular flight. Upon landing, they were met by their guides: Moira from Inverness and Angus from the Isle of Skye. Massive immediate plot twist: Moira was actually a third cousin to Jim whom Trinder had hired especially. Angus (yep, you’ve guessed it) was a second cousin (once removed) to Isla, also hand-picked by the platform. The cherry on top of the family reunion was that both guides knew their stuff: degreed as they were in a mixture of conservational science and ancient Scottish history, they both brought fascinating information to each stop of the tour in droves.
As the journey progressed, the Finnesons’ travel choices remained consistent: Trinder complied with the family’s core values by booking an electric car. Isla, egged on by her pups, embraced the technology by opening it up on the highways; zooming through the Highlands until the forests blended into the mountains, creating a world of dark greens and blue-greys as they blurred past. Equally significant were the times the family spent in the quiet nature by lochs or springs, each finding a deeper sense of self as they finally experienced their birth right. Apart from Albie, who was mostly hungry. His needs were taken very seriously by the platform: every curated dining experience was a celebration of fresh, local flavours, showcasing the best of Scotland’s rich produce. A clean plate from the kid, every night, showed his satisfaction with the country’s offerings. For every much-needed sleep, Trinder anticipated they wouldn’t feel comfortable in grand hotel resorts, and so their lodgings were invariably the eco-friendly lodges or B&Bs that were popping up like fairy mushrooms all over Scotland, with gleaming solar panels and net-zero policies.
As Jim and Isla devoured their Scottish histories, they made sure to give back to their country of origin. Trinder suggested tree-planting as a regular activity along their route: smartly anticipating this as a perfect symbol to the Finnesons’ commitment to preserving the roots they were exploring. As Agnes and Alba went at each other with (thankfully) wooden swords, their parents planted future forests. Whilst the kids were absolutely transfixed by Moira’s technology, which could cast lifelike images of past castles and dwellings on since barren areas, Jim and Isla reconnected with the land. Angus, noting this sustainable zeal in the Finnesons, also introduced them to eco-fishing, whereby sensors were used not to detect any fish that might be tempted by the bait, but located only the sustainable shoals of Scotland’s shores, along with menus designed specifically to ensure that any catches would be the most delicious meal the Finnesons had ever tasted.
The Finnesons took a vacation which finally legitimised their rec room of tartan back in Chicago. They made their polite introduction to the land, the lochs, the mercurial oceans. They had not just “visited” Scotland. They had lived and breathed it, exuding a commitment to its longevity in the process. They reasserted their heritage and, at the same time, forged a pact with Scotland’s environment, ensuring that the ancestral home they loved would be there for generations of Finnesons to come.
Provocation Questions
As we move deeper into the climate crisis, what motivations for travel become more or less important?
Is seeking family heritage something that can be done sustainably?
What technology that exists today could be combined to begin to develop what was described in this narrative?