Integrated Smart Infrastructure

We can date the beginning of the smart cities era in mid 80s of XX century, when the City of Barcelona draw the first strategic plan for its transformation. As it was explained to us by Joan Clos, former Mayor of Barcelona (1997-2006), the promoter team of this transformation put the process foundation on the objective to create jobs. Barcelona needed a transformation because of the economic crisis in that time which leaved the city with 60K jobs for 1 million habitants.

Barcelona is the oldest smart city project known by us. It was planed in the mid 80s of the last century and since then, it have been developing. Today, many cities planning teams are learning from its experience, replicating and evolving the concepts.

The best thing in not being a pioneer is that one can learned from the errors of the pioneers. Today, the digital transformation is a reality which has transformed the ways of doing on all levels: individual, social and political. The people have been transformed with the adoption of the mobile communications. The businesses have been transformed through virtualising their processes. The cities have been transformed with the deployment of intelligent devices on a scale.

We have analysed the success of the digital transformation of the European cities in the framework of the EU HORIZON 2020 program on Smart Cities and Communities. There are a few trends that have been defined based on the following basic learnings.

• Smart City Brand. The smart cities projects which succeed to scale up their innovation pilots have a city brand. All of them have defined their identity as more than a smart city. Barcelona is a Digital City. Eindhoven is a Brainport. Amsterdam is Circular City.
• Citizen interaction is more important than just process optimisation. Digital transformation have been promoted as the solution for process optimisation, cost reduction and economic growth. First business, then cities adopted technologies only for this purpose. Years later, it was proved that the success is related more to user/citizen engagement than process and financial optimisations. 
• Integration. Smart city infrastructure normally is a network of thousand to million connected devices. It was shown during the last decade through the effort to deploy those networks on scale, that technological integration and unified standards are the fundaments for success.  

Based on the examples of Barcelona and other European cities, we define the new horizon in the city planing as the design and implementation of integrated smart infrastructures. We define an integrated smart infrastructure the one with the following elements:

• Identity Integration: An interactive infrastructure creates culture. The city identity’s purpose which the infrastructure will served is its backbone. The integration of the city brand asures that the infrastructure is integrated homogeneous in the city landscape and won’t stand alone as something artificial to the city life. 
• People Integration. The infrastructure is interactive with the people. The citizens are present in all the process’s steps from the design, through the deployment to the final exploitation. The infrastructure converts the citizen from a passive consumer into an active prosumer.
• Data Integration. To be an interactive infrastructure, it consumes, creates and acts with/on data. The design of the flow of data within the infrastructure is called Data Model. The Data Model is a key element for the successful deployment and exploitation of the smart infrastructure.
• Technological Integration. One infrastructure provides multiple services. It is a key element for the acceleration of the deployment on scale, for the minimisation of costs and maintenance needs.
• Unified Legal Framework. An integrated smart infrastructure needs a unified legal framework for its purpose as a provider of multiple public services. It asures smooth hybrid operations between multiple stakeholders. 

After more than 20 years in smart city developing around the world and hundreds of cities digitally transformed, we are at the dawn of the new era of smart cities. What cities have been experienced as trying to become smart until today was a digital transformation. In the new era of smart cities, it will be building futures.

This shift in the approach comes natural from the digital transformation as passive systems convert into interactive.

Additional to the new opportunities created by the interactiveness, the acceleration of the technological development accelerates a cultural and social transformation. The reality around us is transformed and our needs evolve. Then, the need for a new approach for the city development emerges. To address this need, we developed the Cities Building Futures methodology.

It is a suitable approach to any type of cities, existing and in project ones, because we always can put a first day for the new era and start the building of the new future.

The Cities Building Futures methodology aims to convert the city to a platform for the accomplishment of the citizen's dreams. A key element in it is the definition of Smart City Brand. The identity of a city shapes its future. We build this identity on the city history, people, traditions & heritage, economic opportunities and dreams for the future.

The integrated smart infrastructure is the vehicle for building the new reality in our novel methodology. Its elements asure the accomplishment of the Smart City Brand through the involvement of the citizens as a basic infrastructure’s element.

The benefits of the Integrated Smart Infrastructure have been studied by us for variety of cases: small municipalities, big cities, regions and countries. These benefits can be summarised in the following key conclusions:

• In all case a reduction of an estimate 60-80% in the deployment time have been identified. An acceleration of the local economy transformation in the first two years of the projects can be observed. 
• The return on the investment has an exponential behaviour as for the same volume of investment a multiple business models can be developed. 
• The needed investment decreases by the number of the services which can be served with an integrated smart infrastructure.
• The management of the integrated smart infrastructure can be simplified due to its unified legal framework which further decreases its maintenance costs.
• In 8 of 10 cases a full automatisation of the processes can be achieved.

The Integrated Smart Infrastructure can be used as a vehicle for building the dreamed future of a city. Cities Building Futures approach for its design defines in first place its purpose and sets the base for the realisation of the new vision for the future. The responsable team in the city council can plan for the next 10, 20, 100 years.

Cities Building Futures approach widely explores future scenarios about social dynamics, public services and city systems, business models and creation of novel economic activities. Citizen engagement, marketing and commercial promotion of the city are key elements of the methodology. We use the Smart City Brand as a macro frame to define the mix of technologies, the initial set of public services and business models which will contribute to the stable return of the investment. We focus on building a traction to the city from the first moment.

The Integrated Smart Infrastructure provides the opportunity for the creation of a new economic reality trough a specialisation of the local economy. It is a real tool to solve any environmental, social and economic challenge. It can empower cities and regions through adoption and exploitations of the technology giving personalised answers about their sustainable growth.

At a regional scale, it creates opportunities for regional stability and prosperity.

To know more about our novel approach follow our projects or subscribe to our professional course Cities Building Futures at connect@creaidealab.com.