The UN report “World Urbanization Prospects” indicates the continuing growth of urban populations, with an expected increase of 2.5 billion people to the world’s urban population by 2050, and a total of 66 percent of the world’s population living in cities by the same year.
It also highlights that challenges for sustainable development will be increasingly concentrated in cities, particularly in the lower-middle-income countries where urbanization is fastest. Such enormous growth trends imply that urban development is both an opportunity and a threat.
In this new context, city planning should radically disrupt the patterns of consumption and use of space and resources of the 20th century and seek more efficient models of city functioning. Urban policies, on the other hand, should provide access to health care, education, public transportation, housing, electricity, water and sanitation, making optimum use of available resources.
The promise of smart cities is that they can address such complex problems and implement more efficient use of resources and more intelligent systems of decision-making and innovation. Smart cities offer hundreds of solutions that enable urban communities to improve the economy of cities, infrastructures and utilities, the environment and living conditions.
Smart cities work by, introducing a series of innovations into the urban system, which are deployed on three innovation circuits. In the first circuit, the digital infrastructure of cities is created; this is composed of broadband networks, access devices, cloud infrastructure, software applications and various types of data coming from citizens and organizations, the public administration, social media and sensors. This digital layer is formed gradually by the continuous enrichment of urban informatics, operating systems and software applications.
In the second circuit, the urban innovation system is enriched by digital assistants and virtual collaboration, such as online planning and city management, crowd-funding platforms and location analytics, which close gaps in capabilities of institutions for innovation. In the third innovation circuit, the behavior of users, citizens and organizations is improved, because the digital infrastructure and platforms of cities enable more informed and efficient individual choices.
These three innovation circuits determine the efficiency of smart cities in the fields of growth, sustainability, utility management and governance. Let’s have a quick horizon scan on smart cities efficiency.
In the field of growth, the global economic outlook over the past five years indicates a slowing down of globalization, but also the emergence of new drivers and technologies that sustain economic growth for the years to come. A key new driver for growth is the digitally transformed business environment and digital markets, which introduce “digital disruptions” to business practices and business models. The organization of companies changes because of affordable hyper-connectivity, web-based collaboration and ubiquitous access over broadband networks. Smart cities offer the environment for this type of business disruption. They provide digital platforms and commons, which other businesses can use as externalities to define their own value proposition.
A good example of smart city strategy aiming at the revitalization of the city economy was the iN2015 (Intelligent Nation 2015), a master plan for turning Singapore into an intelligent island. The plan identified the most important sectors of economic activity of the city, from logistics and manufacturing to media, financial services and health care, and designed digital infrastructure specific to each industry, with a goal of creating up to 80,000 additional jobs.
In the field of environment, smart city solutions contribute to environmental sustainability through energy optimization and conservation. For instance, sensor-based solutions and smart grids can reduce energy consumption and peak demand.
Most disruptive, however, is the contribution of smart cities to sustainability through the rise of “zero culture.” Zero-carbon cities, zero-fatal accident cities and zero-waste cities are visions for complex cyber, physical and institutional environments that enable radical and effective solutions to urban challenges. Another very good demonstration of this logic is the “zero vision” initiative, the road safety plan initially developed in cities of Sweden and currently under implementation in New York, which understands traffic crashes as the result of actions that can be prevented through city re-design, digital technology, real-time alert, education, and law enforcement.
Amsterdam Smart City (ASC) is among the best showcases of smart city projects, applications and solutions globally. Initiated in 2009, ASC covers 10 domains of city life, with 93 ongoing and completed projects. Overall, while the first round of ASC projects has had only a limited impact, scaled-up versions projects have much greater potential.
However, in a series of applied smart city projects, it became clear that the effectiveness of smart city solutions depends on a kind of “connected intelligence” that sets networks among people, software, and institutions targeted to a well-defined vision or objective. Because of these dense networks of information flow, knowledge sharing and collaboration, smart city development and planning are radically different from traditional city development and planning.
• The writer is Professor of Urban Development and Innovation Policy at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. In partnership with The Mark News.
It also highlights that challenges for sustainable development will be increasingly concentrated in cities, particularly in the lower-middle-income countries where urbanization is fastest. Such enormous growth trends imply that urban development is both an opportunity and a threat.
In this new context, city planning should radically disrupt the patterns of consumption and use of space and resources of the 20th century and seek more efficient models of city functioning. Urban policies, on the other hand, should provide access to health care, education, public transportation, housing, electricity, water and sanitation, making optimum use of available resources.
The promise of smart cities is that they can address such complex problems and implement more efficient use of resources and more intelligent systems of decision-making and innovation. Smart cities offer hundreds of solutions that enable urban communities to improve the economy of cities, infrastructures and utilities, the environment and living conditions.
Smart cities work by, introducing a series of innovations into the urban system, which are deployed on three innovation circuits. In the first circuit, the digital infrastructure of cities is created; this is composed of broadband networks, access devices, cloud infrastructure, software applications and various types of data coming from citizens and organizations, the public administration, social media and sensors. This digital layer is formed gradually by the continuous enrichment of urban informatics, operating systems and software applications.
In the second circuit, the urban innovation system is enriched by digital assistants and virtual collaboration, such as online planning and city management, crowd-funding platforms and location analytics, which close gaps in capabilities of institutions for innovation. In the third innovation circuit, the behavior of users, citizens and organizations is improved, because the digital infrastructure and platforms of cities enable more informed and efficient individual choices.
These three innovation circuits determine the efficiency of smart cities in the fields of growth, sustainability, utility management and governance. Let’s have a quick horizon scan on smart cities efficiency.
In the field of growth, the global economic outlook over the past five years indicates a slowing down of globalization, but also the emergence of new drivers and technologies that sustain economic growth for the years to come. A key new driver for growth is the digitally transformed business environment and digital markets, which introduce “digital disruptions” to business practices and business models. The organization of companies changes because of affordable hyper-connectivity, web-based collaboration and ubiquitous access over broadband networks. Smart cities offer the environment for this type of business disruption. They provide digital platforms and commons, which other businesses can use as externalities to define their own value proposition.
A good example of smart city strategy aiming at the revitalization of the city economy was the iN2015 (Intelligent Nation 2015), a master plan for turning Singapore into an intelligent island. The plan identified the most important sectors of economic activity of the city, from logistics and manufacturing to media, financial services and health care, and designed digital infrastructure specific to each industry, with a goal of creating up to 80,000 additional jobs.
In the field of environment, smart city solutions contribute to environmental sustainability through energy optimization and conservation. For instance, sensor-based solutions and smart grids can reduce energy consumption and peak demand.
Most disruptive, however, is the contribution of smart cities to sustainability through the rise of “zero culture.” Zero-carbon cities, zero-fatal accident cities and zero-waste cities are visions for complex cyber, physical and institutional environments that enable radical and effective solutions to urban challenges. Another very good demonstration of this logic is the “zero vision” initiative, the road safety plan initially developed in cities of Sweden and currently under implementation in New York, which understands traffic crashes as the result of actions that can be prevented through city re-design, digital technology, real-time alert, education, and law enforcement.
Amsterdam Smart City (ASC) is among the best showcases of smart city projects, applications and solutions globally. Initiated in 2009, ASC covers 10 domains of city life, with 93 ongoing and completed projects. Overall, while the first round of ASC projects has had only a limited impact, scaled-up versions projects have much greater potential.
However, in a series of applied smart city projects, it became clear that the effectiveness of smart city solutions depends on a kind of “connected intelligence” that sets networks among people, software, and institutions targeted to a well-defined vision or objective. Because of these dense networks of information flow, knowledge sharing and collaboration, smart city development and planning are radically different from traditional city development and planning.
• The writer is Professor of Urban Development and Innovation Policy at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. In partnership with The Mark News.
