The Future of Birmingham: 101
By Wade Kwon•
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- Hipsters forced to sit in the back of the (solar-powered) (karaoke) bus.
- Automated city council pay raises with compounded interest.
- Newspaper printed three times a month on super-secret schedule.
- CrossPlex holds IronTribe CrossFit Games; nerds hide in basements.
- Drivers use bike lanes as intended … “emergency” parking.
- Barbecue-flavored craft beer.
- And deep-fried gourmet popsicles.
- And throwed trolls.
- Our inevitable annexation by Atlanta.
- City lands not one but two NFL franchises fleeing gently used stadiums.
- UAB football team disbanded for second time, during winning drive of national championship game.
- Vulcan gets a tattoo!
- No more toxic dumps — cancer injected directly into North Birmingham residents.
- Farm-to-table movement grows crops directly in dirt pile on your dinner plate.
- Newly rebuilt I-20/59 collapses after looters strip it for copper wiring.
- Illegal immigrants escape impoverished Hoover to sneak into the land of promise, McCalla.
- Nightly races between Taco, Hot Dog and recently out-of-work Finebaum. (Spoiler: Finebaum cheats.)
- As Millennials turn 30, indicated by flashing crystals in their hands, they come to Boutwell for the renewal of Carousel.
- The Combloggerator Matrix comes online, mercilessly assimilating all posts and bloggers.
- The new Publix? All bread and milk.
- The new Trader Joe’s? Speculoos Cookie Mayo.
- Fusion-powered Bank for Savings rooftop sign visible from space.
- MTV arrives to film an episode of “Pimp My Airport.”
- New sport diathlon from combining firing ranges and trampoline parks.
- Bessemer revolts, dumping sweet tea into Alabama Splash Adventure.
- Airwaves ruled by wacky morning team of Barkley and Bubba.
- The gUber app: Users get rides from ’82 Camaros with flame decals (seat belts and airbags optional).
- Tiny trailers infest Homewood … with cuteness!
- Schools sort children into bins: Soylent Green, Soylent Teriyaki, Soylent Gluten-Free.
- St. Paul and the Nicely Mended Bones, thanks to rehab at UAB Hospital.
- “Welcome to the Courteney Cox-Kwon Museum and Muffler Shop!”
- Everyone lives in at least two condos and parks in their living rooms.
- The zoo’s biggest attraction? Man!!!
- Advanced parking meters simply explode at random.
- A lone survivor crosses the food desert in search of rhubarb.
- Self-driving city buses take payment in cash, tokens and stray animals.
- Prize2theFuture … ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!!!
- In Trussville, you’re either eastern Walmart or western Walmart.
- Loudspeakers from every corner blare sports talk radio nonstop.
- “The Walking Dead,” but with fatter, slower zombies.
- Drone delivery of tacos is a thing. Like, straight to your greedy tacohole.
- City flag? Magician’s hat with a dead rabbit.
- City mascot? Diabetes.
- Bus terminal smell upgraded to “uptown funk.”
- Steel plants converted into discotheques.
- Segregation limited to humans, cyborgs and robots.
- We finally land a car factory. It’s for the Kia Mucus.
- #HashtagCity
- (No, seriously. That’s our new nickname.)
- Water/sewer bills in convenient podcast form.
- Kiddieland reopened to genetically engineered dinosaurs that can never ever go berserk and devour their human masters.
- Meat and four, baby.
- (The four are also meats.)
- Montgomery takes Birmingham’s lunch money, holds the city upside-down over a toilet.
- Mayoral debates via Dubsmash.
- Quantum technology allows pork to be simultaneously chopped and sliced.
- Some dissension over 50-foot Larry Langford bronze statue in Linn Park.
- Cyber attack exposes everyone’s real names from al.com usernames.
- The World Games never leaves. IT NEVER LEAVES.
- Secret NASCAR races inside Century Plaza.
- Pop-up eating contests.
- Baptists now greet each other at the liquor store and the strip club.
- Richard Scrushy holds city hostage with a mustache ray and taunts a helpless public.
- Lacrosse, but with balled-up copperheads.
- Prominent websites continue to include Birmingham in Top 10 lists, but only ironically.
- The Barons move to Mt. Olive.
- Giuseppe Moretti LXXXIII discovers the remains of the tiny Statue of Liberty and the horrifying origin of the City of the Apes.
- Rectal vaping not only encouraged but mandatory.
- Annual city budget is one part speed traps, one part business licenses, one part GoFundMe campaign.
- Dome built in wrong shape.
- The final phase of gentrification goes perfectly, as every house in Birmingham costs at least $500,000.
- The Regions Park Supermax Correctional Facility.
- Megachurches become sentient, overcharge for coffee.
- Birmingham Bowl played to the death, as per ESPN rules.
- Public spaces: dog park, cat park, skateboard park, hoverboard park, Confederate dog park, sacred Indian burial ground park.
- Everyone finishes the new Metric Mercedes Marathon, a bracing 26.2 meters.
- Clone of Lou Wooster saves city after Ebola epidemic.
- Elevated 280 barely used by hover cars.
- Paying sales tax requires installment plan.
- One-way streets all head north-northeast.
- Mountain Brook grows clones each fall for fresh harvest of domestic servants.
- The last locally owned company does, in fact, turn off the lights.
- GMOs hold Pepper Place hostage.
- Thanks to stern billboards, human trafficking down 70 percent.
- Everything is as Sun Ra predicted.
- By the light of the full moon, Condoleezza stalks the city streets, a grim avenger of the night.
- The Second Life version of Birmingham suffers from clone flight.
- Graffiti king Moist becomes artist laureate.
- We feed the poor feral cats.
- Correction: We feed the poor to feral cats.
- A revitalized Ensley still only one-third full.
- Trains merely slow down at station, as passengers expected to hop off and on quickly.
- Bonnaroo juggernaut leaves our festivals with drummer from Blink-182 plus Kenny Chesney.
- County bankruptcy paid off, but debt collectors keep calling at all hours.
- School days and sporting events begin with civic anthem, “Do I Make You Proud?”
- Civil Rights Heritage Trail selfie stations.
- Police body cam footage powers entire season of “Cops” and “The First 48.”
- Plasma force fields shield buildings from tornadoes, debris and other outside agitators.
- Home schooling expanded to home churching, home sporting.
- Upon sudden impact, cars equipped to deploy business cards for Alexander Shunnarah.
- Red Mountain renamed Peak Birmingham.
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Read more essays in our special 10th anniversary series, The Future of Birmingham.
Friday, September 18, 2015, 7:18 am
It’s a bright and terrifying future! I can’t wait! Great list!
Friday, September 18, 2015, 1:13 pm
Thanks, Chris! 🙂