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Welcome to today’s What is The Future For Cities podcast and its Research episode; my name is Fanni, and today I will introduce a research paper by summarising it. The episode really is just a short summary of the original paper, and, in case it is interesting enough, I would encourage everyone to check out the whole paper.

Our summary today works with the article titled Smart cities – a road map for development from 2018 by Sam Musa, published in IEEE Potentials journal. Since we are investigating the future of cities, I thought it would be interesting to understand how a practical approach defines smart city as the future of cities. This article introduces a city-wide smart, secure and resilient transformation needed in light of urban challenges.

Musa starts off with the urbanisation challenges and prospects – people living in ever-increasing numbers in cities which are set to be the biggest energy users and emitters. As a result, it is imperative to develop solutions that improve the liveability of cities while vividly reducing resource consumption. There is a need for city-wide, smart, secure and resilient transformation. Technology can mitigate such challenges and risks, and the cities chief information officers need to tackle many issues to achieve smart city government. In short, governments need to develop roadmaps for their smart cities to create real economic opportunities and save lives.

Smart city, in Musa’s understanding, is a city that engages its citizens and connects its infrastructure electronically. People, processes and technology are three major elements that shape a smart city. Smart city has the ability to integrate multiple technological solutions in a secure fashion to manage assets. The goal of building a smart city is to improve the quality of life by using technology to improve the efficiency of services and meet residents’ needs. A smart city offers technological solutions that explain what is happening in the city, how it is evolving, and how to enable better quality of life for its residents.

The technology used in smart cities can be an instrument to protect lives and improve services and business processes and protect personally identifiable information and critical infrastructure. Technology also can decrease crime by geographically spotting areas with high crime rates, among others, by using sensors. Sensors are small measurement devices that can be integrated with electronics to detect certain sounds or levels of variations, either in active or passive way. The active sensors process data and create reaction, like parking sensors, while the passive only collects data, like the weather stations. The network of physical devices or things that work collaboratively by collecting, exchanging and processing data is known as the IoT. These sensors can be controlled remotely and can be used to improve the ability to plan ahead, therefore, to be and act smart.

Technology can also enhance resilience. A technologically resilient city focuses on economy, society, infrastructure, mobility, strategic planning and a healthy relationship with all residents. Building a sustainable technological infrastructure that provides reliable communications and mobility is one attribute of a resilient city. Resilient cities demonstrate many qualities and attributes that allow them to withstand and adapt more readily to shocks, such as unemployment, inefficient public transport, earthquakes. Resilient cities can enhance their capability by asserting past experiences and learning from them to inform safer future decisions and remain protected from shocks and stresses. Technology can help emergency preparedness and training and redundancy with critical data storages to create a more resilient, therefore, smarter city.

To build a smart and secure city, technology is important but not the only elements. Residents and city employees have an equally important role. They need to be engaged in the decision-making processes, value their feedback and encourage them to be involved in solving urban problems. Studies have also shown that citizens’ engagement around the urban budget process led to improvement and satisfaction in creating measurable tax collection. Collaboration needs to include the design of effective solutions and discussions of opportunities.

Electronic government, also known as e-governance, involves the use of technology to provide services to the public. The goal of the e-government is to improve service delivery methods and enhance citizens’ involvement in public services. E-government can help stimulate economic growth, promote effective natural resource management, and promote social engagement. Leadership presented by the government must be visionary and have the desire, ability and capability to build a safe and secure smart environment.

Musa recommends governments to create a road map to embark on smart city initiatives. This notion should start with studying the community, developing smart city policy, and engaging the community through e-government and a solid city-wide wifi infrastructure. The question also must be asked why such an initiative is needed. Understanding demographics can answer such a question and provide the required insights to develop the city to be convenient, liveable, vibrant and connected to the citizens living there. Additionally, citizens create the demand which governments are obligated to answer. The smart city policy driving the whole initiative should define roles, responsibilities, strategies and objectives of a smart city. This also creates the basis for resources, money, and other requirements to be supplemented. Finally, citizen engagement through e-governance and effective governance leads to increasing efficiency and enhanced delivery of services. It can build trust and make them part of the solution.

People, processes and technology are three pillars of smart-city initiatives that can be utilised to alleviate urban challenges. Governments should study their communities, create policies and implement technological solutions to meet the needs of their local communities, and they also must be innovative and develop a road map to address and provide solutions to mitigate risks and challenges to create a sustainable future for their citizens. Digital transformation is one option that governments can rely on to overcome many of these challenges, and other options may include e-governance and engaging residents. Officials must build a coalition to collaborate, leverage and integrate technologies to create real economic opportunities by fostering a city-wide, smart, secure and resilient transformation.

As the most important things, I would like to highlight 3 aspects:

1. Smart city has three pillars in the practical approach of Musa, people, processes and technologies.
2. Digital transformation is just one step of the many a city can take towards the future.
3. To achieve the smart future, cities need to create a road map in collaboration with the people, which guides their initiatives and projects.

Additionally, it would be great to talk about the following questions:

1. Why is the government leading if it should be driven by the people?
2. Is really the government leading, or it just provides the framework in which innovation happens in industry?
3. How can a city achieve smartness without technology? Is it possible to achieve it without technology?

What was the most interesting part for you? What questions did arise for you? Do you have any follow up questions? Let me know on Twitter @WTF4Cities or on the website where the transcripts and show notes are available! I hope this was an interesting research for you as well, and thanks for tuning in!

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