WCIT: How smart cities and sustainability are changing the world
Fifty-two per cent of the world’s population lives in cities. Now, imagine a city where subways and cars drive themselves, your iPad controls your home, and cops can predict crime before it happens.
This may sound futuristic, but it’s already here. Technological and digital innovations are making cities and transportation smarter, paving the way for feats we could have never dreamed of before. Smart cities depend on the creation and implementation of more efficient, green and effective technologies.
This week we’re diving into the role digital technologies play in smart cities and transportation. This is the third theme of this year’s World Congress of Information Technology (WCIT) where up to 3,000 delegates from more than 80 countries will meet in Montreal in October to develop a Global Digital Society Action Plan that will not only shape the future of information technologies (IT) but also the future of humanity.
As a partner of WCIT, we’re holding the CareerMash Youth Tech Jam, - school events, online activities, contests and prizes through April and May leading up to a large student Jam at the Science Centre on May 11. For full details, check out our brand new CareerMash Youth Tech Jam web page, which also includes links to all our previous blogs on how digital technologies are changing our world.
As part of the CareerMash Youth Tech Jam activities, we’re looking for your ideas on how smart cities and sustainability can have a global impact. Here are just some of the ways we’ve found. What have we missed? Is your town doing something innovative? Tell us below!
Smart City Songdo, South Korea
Songdo, South Korea is a city from the future. The $35-billion city was built from scratch. Cisco recently sent one of their employees to create a video series documenting the way the city has embraced smart technologies. Escalators save energy and costs by only moving when people ride them. Buildings are connected through a network that allows residents to remotely control utilities used in their homes. People can communicate by video from anywhere. And the city is built for pedestrians to limit traffic and pollution. Songdo is one of over 100 smart city projects worldwide.
Cisco also uses digital tech to help make communities smarter. One example is to make finding seats and getting around major sporting events easier. Read more about this and other Cisco developments on its Community+Connect page.
What other technologies do you think existing cities can adopt to become smarter?
Automated Public Transportation
Bombardier argues that smart cities need to start with smart transportation. The company believes cities need to create integrated mobility that combines rail, automotive, bicycles and walking. Bombardier has developed energy-saving, sleeker and greener trains, as well as automated and driverless monorails designed to connect more people to the city. More efficient transportation is better for the environment and encourages people to take transit.
What other ways do you think automated transportation can help make cities smarter?
Automated Automobiles
Imagine your car drove itself and you never had to wait in traffic ever again? Peter Stone, a professor of computer science at the University of Texas at Austin, has designed a new kind of traffic intersection for automated, driverless cars. Driverless cars were recently made legal in Nevada in anticipation of what’s expected to come. Professor Stone’s system would allow autonomous cars to automatically send a signal to a virtual traffic coordinator with its destination information. A computer program at the intersection coordinates the requests and assigns the car particular times and routes to get there without interference. Stone thinks it is a faster and safer way to travel.
Do you think Stone is right? What about pedestrians?
Analyzing Crime Data
IBM has developed software that enables police forces to find patterns in crime data. It’s a smart-city project that already has real world results. In Memphis, Tennessee, software analyzes crime data from across the city within an hour to evaluate crime patterns and identify “hot spots” to deploy police resources where they are needed most. In 2010, the technology helped reduce crime to its lowest in a quarter century.
Memphis is one of more than 2,000 smart city projects worldwide that uses data analytics to cut crime, pollution and traffic congestion. BusinessWeek magazine reports that $108 billion will be spent on data analytical tools over the next decade, which is estimated to amp up software development for companies such as IBM and device makers like HTC Corp.
What other kind of data can be collected from a city and how can it be analyzed to make it smarter?
Home Automation
If everything else is smart, shouldn’t your house be too? The iPad alone is making huge strides in home automation, which uses digital technologies to streamline your house. Apps and downloads turn the iPad into a remote control for your entire house. You can make all of your home entertainment work together and even lower window shades and lights when a movie starts. You can childproof TV, control the temperature lock and monitor your garage door and record video surveillance in your house.
What other ways can digital technologies automate things in your home?
Automation and transportation are the future of our cities. There is a lot of information available on the Internet about this topic including innovations such as high-tech cars that allow blind people to drive. Try to think of these things from a global perspective. How can it change the way we travel? Interact? Raise families? Go to work? Build cities? Let us know by commenting below!