SDG 11 — Smart Cities
Written by Chanchal, class 11 (India)
This article is part of our 2020 Sustainable September Campaign. This article is written by a student participant of the School of Active Citizenship Young Leaders Policy Lab (YLPL) programme. Read more about the campaign here!
Sustainable Development Goal 11 — Sustainable Cities & Communities
Target B: By 2020, substantially increase the number of cities and human settlements adopting and implementing integrated policies and plans towards inclusion, resource efficiency, mitigation and adaptation to climate change, resilience to disasters, and develop and implement, in line with the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015–2030, holistic disaster risk management at all levels
Introduction
WHAT IS A SMART CITY? A smart city is a developed urban area that creates sustainable economic development and high quality of life by excelling in multiple key areas: economy, mobility, environment, people, living, and government. There is no specific universal definition of a “smart city”. The conceptualisation of a Smart City, therefore, varies from city to city and country to country, depending on the level of development, willingness to change and reform, resources and aspirations of the city residents.
To understand what a smart city is, it is important to know that “smart” in this context doesn’t refer to a characteristic that defines the city, but rather a tool. “Smart” is used in the context of describing the city’s ability to create well-being for its citizens. Cities use this tool to collect data in real time about all kinds of things, including traffic, air and water quality, and solar radiation. With this information, the government can act immediately to solve nearly any problem.
WHY IS THERE A NEED FOR SMART CITIES?
Our world population has increased significantly in the last decades and so has the expectation of living standards. It is predicted that around 70% of the world’s population will live in urban areas by the year 2050. At present cities consume 75% of the world’s resources and energy which leads to the generation of 80% of greenhouse gases. Thus, in the next few decades this will have a severe negative impact on the environment. As our planet becomes more “urban”, the cities have to be smarter. This makes the concept of smart city a necessity.
WHAT MAKES A CITY SMART?
Smart cities use intelligent solutions to optimise infrastructure as well as smart and responsive governance to engage citizens in the management of their city. Generally, it requires intelligent Internet of Things (IoT) solutions that optimise infrastructure and government to better engage citizens in the management of services. Sensors, networks, and applications collect data on energy usage, traffic volume and patterns, pollution levels, and other topics which are then analysed and used to correct and predict usage and patterns. Making that data available to everyone through open-access systems allows citizens and businesses to leverage the information for other purposes.
Smart Cities: Global Models
Some of the best models of smart cities are Singapore, London and Barcelona:
SINGAPORE
Singapore is an indisputable leader when it comes to smart mobility, safety, healthcare and convenient administrative services. Visitors to Singapore often say they feel as if they are living in the future — a sentiment shared by many respondents to the 2017 Smart Cities World survey, who nominated the technocentric Asian city as the smartest city in the world. As part of its smart efforts, the city implemented a transportation system called One Monitoring, a comprehensive portal whereby citizens can access traffic information collected from surveillance cameras installed on roads and taxi vehicles using GPS. More recently, the government has introduced “eCitizen Ideas,” a government crowdsourcing portal that allows citizens to share or contribute ideas related to issues faced by the public, often through competitions, hackathons, and campaigns organised by various public agencies (GovTech Singapore 2017b; Singapore Government 2017). As is evident in these platforms, as well as the processes that have culminated in their creation, policy co-creation largely led and driven by the state.
LONDON
London is a leader in new ‘CleanTech’ products, such as sensors that create data in new ways to combat the causes and effects of pollution and climate change. For example, London already has access to the largest network of air quality monitors of any city, with world-class modelling and emissions forecasting. The GLA now co-leads the C40 Air Quality Network, which is investing USD1 million in a challenge to create lower-cost air quality sensing technology to directly measure thousands more locations in London to complement London’s 100 air quality monitoring stations.
London’s long term and interventionist approach is something other cities can look up to. They promote complete collaboration between all stakeholders, put connectivity and innovation at the forefront. London is also home to many cultural, academic and civil society institutions that are thought-leaders in this field. Examples include the Open Data Institute, Nesta, the Catapults and London’s internationally recognised universities and innovation.
BARCELONA
Barcelona, is often known for its sunny skies! Being the smart city that it is Barcelona has put that solar power to use. In 2006 they became the first city to require the use of solar water heaters.
Barcelona was one of the first European cities to adapt smart city technologies. Barcelona is the very expression of the shift towards the intention to become a smart city by deploying digital tools to engage its citizens and to empower them to initiate the use of digital devises themselves. They have advanced waste management system as well. An underground vacuum network has been set up which sucks up the trash from below the ground. It was the first city in the world to have a public network of fab labs, small-scale workshop offering (personal) digital fabrication. The premise of this enterprise was simple: “no smart city without smart citizens”. This city has been wise in the use of renewable sources of energy. No city is perfect and there are always ways in which it can improve. But Barcelona is truly showing that it is a leader and innovator of Smart Cities.
Challenges in Becoming a Smart City
Despite the countless benefits of smart city projects, there are still challenges when it comes to deployment, due to unique city requirements and differing interpretations of deployment concepts. As IoT and sensor technology usage expands, so does the threat level to security. This begs the question —
is technology really considered “smart” if hackers can break into it and shut down an entire city?
A recent discussion involving cyber-terror threats to vulnerable and outdated power grids has concerned everyone and raised scepticism about technology and security. One of the biggest challenges is educating and engaging the community. It needs “smart” citizens who are engaged and actively taking advantage of new technologies.
When technology, city governance, and communities come together to improve the quality of life for everyone involved, that is when a city truly becomes “smart.”
Chanchal is a class 11 student, graduated from Jai Hing English School, Pune. She wants to serve her country and bring a change to people’s lives by eradicating the inequalities that exist across the region.
NOTE:
The views and opinions expressed in this article are solely by the author(s) and do not represent that of the Asia-Europe Foundation (ASEF).
Copyright © 2020.
