The Digital-Analog City

Welcome to Vienna, where the centuries coexist happily

Photo: Unsplash

Greetings from Vienna. I’m here this week, researching my new book project on the geography of awe.

Vienna is an odd city, and an instructive one.

On the one hand, it is among the world’s most modern, plugged-in cities. Land at the airport then hop on a sleek, fast train that whisks you downtown in minutes. Fire up your smartphone and log on to one of the many free wifi hotspots—at museums, plazas, transit hubs and elsewhere. Need to get around town? Download the all-in-one WienMobil, which covers transport on tram, subway, bike, car-share and e-scooter. At intersections, sensors adjust the timing of traffic lights based on current conditions and public transport priority. Don’t bother using an ATM. This is, with few exceptions. a thoroughly cashless city.

Yet at the same time there is something refreshingly analog about Vienna. Some 200 antique shops dot the city, more per capita than anywhere else in the world. And that’s not counting the surfeit of thrift stores, where I spent many an hour and Euro. I was surprised to find more than one travel agency here (I thought they were extinct), and quirky specialty shops: stores that sell only gloves or hats, batteries or buttons. The shopkeepers take pride in their singular product lines and shudder at the thought of expanding their offerings. And, whatever you do, do not attempt to buy a hat in a glove store or a glove in a hat store. It isn’t done.

In Vienna, time moves at an analog pace, too. The city’s famous coffee shops are living proof that faster is not always better. Order a single cafe kleinen and spend an entire afternoon, or day, at your favorite cafe. The server will never—never—suggest you order another coffee or move along. My friend, John, an American living in Vienna, explains it this way:

“The cafe is where you go and you sit, you read, and somehow you absorb life in these places. You don’t go there because you need to be a little bit more awake for your next meeting. You go because you want to absorb something in your life, or you want to reflect on something or you just want to read the paper or just want to tune out for a while.”

In Vienna, languidness isn’t an indulgence or a luxury; it is a necessity, and an expectation.

How to explain this apparent contradiction between digital and analog Vienna? In a word: history.

Vienna is awash in history but doesn’t drown in it. The city celebrates its past but doesn’t live off it.

A sort of proud nonchalance defines the relationship between past and present. “People here value the past but that doesn’t preclude them from having a very distinctive kind of lifestyle in the present,” John tells me. “It’s related to the past but it’s not of the past.”

Consider the Theater an der Wien. Vienna’s oldest concert hall, it first opened its doors in 1801. Beethoven performed here and, for a while, lived here too. Walk inside and you are transported to another era, yet with one foot firmly in the present. During a recent renovation, the theater installed the latest in acoustics technology. It makes a kind of three-dimensional sound print of the concert hall. Audio engineers can actually adjust the acoustics based on, say, the musical performance and audience size. Yet the hall’s custodians steadfastly refuse to electronically amplify any of the musical instruments. To do so would betray the past.

Vienna reminds us that the past and present need not clash; they can co-exist, and so too can technology. The new need not displace the old. Your e-book can supplement, not replace, a hardcover. In a city like Vienna, there is room for an Apple store and the dusty shop selling buttons, and only buttons. Here, you can ride an e-scooter to your favorite cafe, pay digitally then log out—and tune in.