What you need to know about Smart City

The United Nations predicts that in 30 years, 67% of the world's population will live in cities, compared to about 57.5% today. Also we have to keep in mind that today there are 8.08 billion people living on Earth, and in 2050 there will be 9.7 billion. So there are about 4.65 billion people living on the planet and in 30 years there will be 6.5 billion. That is one less India than the current population of the whole planet!

Already today the problem of overpopulation is evident in many of our planet's megacities. Often space and resources are used inefficiently, trash is not cleaned up in time, and people stand in lines. All such problems must be solved by the Smart City.

Smart City

The urban planning concept of the smart city involves the modernization of infrastructure, integration of information, telecommunication technologies and the Internet of things to organize and control all urban public services.

There are three strategies for implementing this concept in the infrastructure of cities:

1. Platform. A basic infrastructure is created and gradually developed, which is necessary regardless of the peculiarities of a particular city.
2. Anchor. The solution to the most acute problem of a particular city is taken as the basis. As it is solved, additional services are created and developed.
3. Beta-city. Several problems are taken at once, pilot projects are introduced, the effectiveness is monitored in the process and the decision is made what to stop and what to implement in the long term.

City authorities around the world choose their own ways, and it cannot be said that any one strategy always proves to be more successful.

The main tasks of transforming ordinary cities into smart ones:

• improving the quality of city services, making them more interactive and productive;
• simplification and improvement of communication between city residents and authorities;
• reducing the expenditures of finances and time;
• reducing the consumption of resources.

The industries that are subject to change during the construction of a smart city:

• transportation;
• administrative services;
• security;
• health care;
• waste management;
• energy;
• utilities and agriculture.

The tools that are used to build a smart city:

• data collection and processing systems;
• databases;
• sensors, sensor panels;
• video cameras;
• ubiquitous broadband Internet access and radio communications (LTE, 5G);
• software as a «smart city interface».

How it would be

Imagine that all the bureaucratic routine, dangers on the streets and roads, waiting in lines and inconveniences associated with public transportation would stop. Our material will help you imagine such a scenario.

What can become smart

Urban environment

• security systems and video surveillance (cameras, biometric scanners);
• lighting (light sensors);
• waste management (sorting, recycling, incineration);
• modern hospitals and polyclinics (electronic cards, queues, communication with patients);
• social services (departure from paper documents in favor of electronic ones).

Transportation system

• automated public-transport payment systems;
• smart parking (license plate and face recognition by cameras);
• green vehicles (lower emissions);
• intelligent transport systems (the number of attendants reduction).

Energy

• smart energy meters;
• automatic control of electricity consumption (lights on only during the dark hours of the day);
• use of renewable energy sources;
• distributed power generation (local additional sources for own needs).

Smart house

• smart meters for gas, electricity and water consumption;
• prevention of breakthroughs / leaks (sensors of flooding, gas, automatic shut-off);
• complex security system (cameras, smoke, fire, glass breaking, movement and door opening sensors);
• smart home appliances.

What are the benefits of implementing smart cities

If you read everything that has been described above, this block becomes as obvious as possible. Life in a smart city is safe, convenient, and focused as much as possible on automation and data manageability. Smart cities are economical, use any resources rationally and recycle most of the waste produced. A person can devote more time to himself and care less about routine matters.

The pitfalls

Around the world, movements to protect privacy and confidential information already exist and are actively developing. Indeed, the concept of smart cities assumes that all information about our actions, movements, purchases, meetings and other things will be stored, analyzed and used.

Already today, based on your searches, site visits, and filling out questionnaires, you are shown ads. Multiply that by 10:

• Histories of all (generally all) ailments will be stored in the electronic medical record.
• The machine will remember all the places visited and offer to come back.
• The smartphone's microphone will hear and transmit everything said near it.
• All the cameras you have passed will record your face.
• Your refrigerator could theoretically be broken into, your freezer defrosted, or your kefir frozen.
• All documents would be easily accessed and you could find out where you live, what you own, your mother's maiden name, and your pet's nickname.

A more specific disadvantage is the mentality of our people. Not everyone is ready to let technology into their lives, so the implementation of smart cities usually takes about 50 years. During this time you can bring up a technologically literate society.

And now the biggest problem is an effective business model and financing. Can you imagine how much money it takes to build such infrastructures? Individual investors cannot and will not be willing to finance such large-scale projects. You need a lot of stakeholders and a well-thought-out strategy. We hope that it will not take long, but now we appreciate what we have today.

For example, today in Kharkiv there are such projects as «Portal of Kharkiv citizen», «Cabinet of Kharkiv citizen», «Zupynka» and «Program of digital literacy». Their implementation has brought us much closer to the status of a smart city. Every citizen of Kharkiv can give a hand to the development of the region and offer his idea to the Reforms Office, which is engaged in such projects.

So if you have ideas to make the urban environment better, don't stay aside!