Eternal smart cities

We are well aware of what a “smart city” is. First of all, it is a predictable city. We can get information about the transport collapse, natural disaster, a fallen tree, the crash of an alien ship - all in real time, while having a clear understanding of which services need to be activated and how to notify the population. However, before we talk about a smart city, let's introduce the criterion of a “stupid” city. This is not as easy as it seems, although you don’t have to go far for examples - Moscow is still far from the title of “city of the future” (in the list of 100 innovative cities in the world, the capital of Russia ranks 63rd).



The problem of most cities lies in the fact that almost all of them can not be considered "smart" from the beginning. Our distant ancestors, establishing and developing the settlement, were guided by completely different principles. So it turned out that most major cities and many capitals are located in the floodplain - the most dangerous place in the vicinity of the river. During a flood or flood, the territory of the city in the floodplain is guaranteed and regularly flooded. Pollutants also accumulate in the floodplains; rivers spill out and erode cemeteries, spreading the infection throughout the course. We gave one of many examples, but in spite of all the dangers, cities can indeed be considered almost immortal.
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Among all the objects created by civilization, cities are more likely to claim eternal status. The first settlements appeared more than 5,000 years ago. Their durability, especially by the standards of ordinary human life, always attracts the attention of researchers. The oldest cities of our world are more than 3,000 years old. For comparison, the oldest companies are about 1,000 years old, and their number is incomparable with the number of ancient cities.

Very few commercial enterprises have existed for at least 100 years. Let us recall how resilient cities can be: hundreds of thousands of houses were almost destroyed as a result of the bombing during World War II. But the buildings were rebuilt and people returned to their habitats. Unlike countries whose borders are very unstable and are subject to revision from time to time, cities actually remain invincible, expanding naturally.

One of the reasons for the sustainability of cities can be considered the fact that they are effective: their growth is associated with an increase in productivity. Cities perfectly perform a social function: they connect some people with others. In the city we find people the same as ourselves, and people completely different from us. The city is a territory where creative people want to live and work in order to cooperate with other people and receive certain benefits of civilization.

According to a recent report by the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs, for the first time in human history, more than half of the world's population lives in cities. By 2030, there will be 41 cities in the world with a population of 10 million or more. And by 2050 already 2/3 people will live in an urban environment.



How to make cities more efficient, given the constant population growth? Companies such as IBM, Cisco and Samsung are actively promoting the concept of “smart cities” using digital technologies. An excellent example of this concept is the IBM Control Center in Rio de Janeiro. It was originally planned to create an operational headquarters for combating natural disasters, but after studying the best practices of other cities, city authorities opted for a model designed for the entire population of the city and all city services, including utilities and public transport. The control center unites more than 30 institutions and partner organizations, reducing response time by eliminating bureaucratic obstacles and encouraging cooperation in every way.

Data from sensors installed throughout the city is being drained into the Center. On a video screen area of ​​over 75 square meters. m. in real time is broadcast with 800 cameras. The round-the-clock Center monitors the main systems of the city, records data on weather forecast, river level, satellite imagery, video, utility data, air and water security services, etc.



As you can imagine, the city generates a huge amount of data - and will generate much more in the near future. With the increase in the number of sensors, many urban areas will produce more data than they receive today at the Large Hadron Collider. The receipt of such a volume of information will require the development of a reliable wireless and wired infrastructure. Investments in next-generation broadband networks will be needed to meet the big data transmission needs.

On the example of Rio de Janeiro, we see that digital technology can be used to improve the efficiency of a city. But at the same time, obstacles remain to the massive introduction of this model. Issues of financial and legal support slow down the process of investing in the necessary infrastructure. There is still a security problem: any systems of this level may contain errors and be hacked. For example, in 2006, an error in the software of the control system for high-speed electric trains plying in the San Francisco Bay area per day led to three complete outages.

Large systems that provide centralized management are a great goal for those who wish to follow all the events in the metropolis. In the postnasudenovskom world, no one can guarantee that the data collected by the inhabitants of the city will not be used for their own purposes by the state, the transnational corporation or any persons who have access to them.

However, there is another way to make the city smarter. In many countries, young activists are trying to solve the issue of access to government data. Provided with technology and the right information, they could implement smart city models better and cheaper (not modeled on control through powerful supercomputers). Large vendors are not able to appreciate the human aspect that makes cities special. Instead of sharing information, cooperating with each other and effectively developing the functional infrastructure of the city, they are more interested in using digital technologies to connect residents to themselves.

Offers from the bottom, based on the use of the Internet, mobile technologies, despite all the attractiveness, have a limit. Small applications designed to serve the residents of a single community are difficult to scale to reach wider segments of the population.



Given the limitations of both “top-down” and “bottom-up” approaches, which way to create smart cities remains the most promising? Mayors in cities such as New York, Boston, Philadelphia and San Francisco are working hard to increase access to government data and help enthusiasts in developing applications that use this data.

In Chicago, for example, a number of initiatives have been proposed that go far beyond the usual introduction of technology. Among the priorities identified in the plan was the need to use technology to improve public services and support civic innovation. The plan also calls for improving the availability of broadband for all businesses and residents.

A number of major cities, including San Francisco, New York, London, Dublin and Singapore, have developed their own technology plans. Although they all share strong faith in the power of technology, each city has approached a problem with a set of distinctive priorities and strategies that reflect its particular characteristics.

Another encouraging sign of progress is the increased interest of researchers in the "science of cities" in an attempt to understand how they work. There are hundreds of thousands of cities in the world, from very tiny to huge megalopolises. The more of them begin to look for ways to use intelligent digital technologies, the sooner we will move into the true world of smart city.