ThoughtLab Featured

Almaty is an ancient city dating to the Bronze Age. Since then, it has undergone many economic, cultural, and political shifts, and is now gearing up for what might be its most significant transformation—becoming a preeminent digital hub in Central Asia.

For Almaty City, becoming future-ready hinges on one thing: its people. Citizens are no longer satisfied with the basic government services of the past, according to Bayan Konirbayev, Almaty’s chief digital officer. “Our citizens have a more global view and expect the same kind of services available in New York, Chicago, or Seoul.”

But the future is not just about what Almaty City can do for its people, it is also about what its people can do for the city. To this end, Almaty’s leaders are focusing on another part of their future vision: attracting and keeping the talent the city needs. “We provide the kind of user-friendly environment not available in most countries nearby,” says Konirbayev. “That is why a lot of talented people are coming here.”

Almaty’s attractions include not only its natural beauty, set in the foothills of the Trans-Ili Alatau mountains, but also its 38 universities. They serve some 182,000 students, who make up more than 9% of the city’s population of 2 million. Once those students graduate,  Almaty seeks to hold onto this talent. 

Laying the digital groundwork 

With that in mind, Almaty has devised a future-ready city plan out to 2050, with phased short-term goals by2025 and medium-term goals for 2030. It seeks to make Almaty a highly livable, smart city with a trendy cosmopolitan atmosphere, modern services, and attractive natural environment. The city is implementing the plan in phases, starting with a major digital transformation.

Konirbayev explains that the city is implementing its digital vision on a three-layer foundation: digital infrastructure, data, and services. The infrastructure layer includes mobile towers and stations, fiber optics, data processing centers, and IoT sensors installed throughout the city. For example, the city has tripled the number of cell phone stations in the last two years, in cooperation with the four telecoms operators providing services.

The data layer includes a unified data governance and data exchange platform and warehouse. Through its data exchange platform and advanced data management system, Almaty has brought together a wide variety of previously siloed data from different government departments, such as social services, education, healthcare, and housing. “It has become our single source of truth,” says Konirbayev. This part of the data warehouse includes personalized data on citizens available only to the city government.

There is also a public side to the data warehouse that includes non-personalized datasets—an innovation that can serve as a model for other municipalities. Almaty has created five central databases in cooperation with the private sector that gather demographic information stripped of personal identifiers.

These databases include a range of information, such as data on spending and borrowing patterns from banks and credit card providers; infrastructure usage data from utilities; and housing data from landlords and real estate firms. The private sector gains access to it on a barter basis—to get data, they must also provide it.

The result is a continuously growing bank of data available to public and private entities to improve city services, infrastructure, and commercial decisions.

As cities face a more challenging future, city leaders need to know the best practices that will allow them to face new threats, tap funding, increase the level of trust among their citizens, and make the best investment decisions. ThoughtLab’s fourth urban research program, Building a Future-Ready City, will provide urban leaders with an action plan for meeting the challenges ahead. ThoughtLab asked sponsors and advisors of our program to share their views on how leaders can face some of the problems ahead. Here is how some of them responded.  

 

1.The recent heat wave throughout Europe and America is a serious reminder of the disruptive effects of climate change. Clearly, a future-ready city will need to be a zero-carbon city. What steps do cities need to take to achieve their longer-term decarbonization goals? 

Bill Cashmore, Deputy Mayor, Auckland Council: Transport must be a primary target for decarbonization; vehicle kilometers traveled must be substantially reduced. Road congestion pricing could be a key incentive for people to move to public transport. Building heat and cooling needs to be powered by renewable energy sources. Manufacturing also needs to transition to renewable energy. 

Kari Aina Eik, Executive Director, United Cities: First, we need to equip leaders with more information and resources to meet these challenging goals. If we are ever going to meet the goals of net-zero cities, we need to build up trust, then develop new processes, and use tools and measures that everyone understands and accepts. Second, we need to build these processes and tools based on available data and technology. If your facts are known and accepted, you can make better decisions. Third, all cities (and all countries) need a digital twin and to start developing model scenarios of cause, effect, and possible solutions. These scenarios and solutions need to be shared and discussed with stakeholders across the board.  

Jayant Kohale, Analytics, Smart Cities, Digital, AI: The impact of global warming has been felt by countries across the globe. The recent high peak temperatures in Europe have resulted in droughts with major water sources drying up. For cities to better prepare for these scenarios, they need to have a declaration and charter which defines and articulates a city’s vision and aspirations to reduce the carbon footprint and to increase the renewable index. In addition, they need investment and development to bring sustainability into the city’s roadmap. 

Bayan Konirbayev, Chief Digital Officer, Almaty City: The problem related to carbon emission basically comes from heating systems and gasoline vehicles. By 2025, the heating system in Almaty should use only gas energy. The problem related to vehicles should be resolved before 2030 by different means,  such as the development of alternative transport, the development of public transport, and the construction of new charging systems for e-cars.  

Andrea Sorri, Segment Business Development, Cities, EMEA, Axis Communications: Cities are becoming increasingly focused on improving mobility, and reducing congestion and pollution, so it’s more important than ever to base decisions on accurate and reliable data. This can be achieved by getting to know the actual traffic flow through clear and analyzable data and the monitoring of individual and group patterns. It’s important when planning and coordinating transport around cities to ensure that any changes and initiatives fit with the way people use services and roadways.  

Weather and air quality sensors can now be co-located with streaming images. This combined video surveillance and weather/air-quality monitoring can give street-by-street observations of actual weather, pollution, and traffic levels. Understanding the link between weather and traffic allows targeted interventions to be deployed to improve air quality. 

Peter Nõu, IT strategist, Uppsala Municipality: Cities need to set stretch goals towards becoming carbon neutral in the near to mid-term. Goals need to be objectively measurable, and the city needs to commit to sharing KPIs. Progress towards the set goals will be measured yearly. Transparency is a given. System boundaries need to be carefully considered. Will the municipality be responsible for the carbon load realized outside its borders through import of goods and services, from the emissions caused by travel by its citizens etc.? Cities ought to collaborate with other cities in developing these KPIs so that the holistic accumulative burden can be assessed as best possible. Sweden is progressive with regards to setting national level climate goals. Uppsala City is among the most progressive climate cities in Sweden having won certain awards three years in a row.

Ramya Ravichandar, Vice President of Product Management, Sustainability & IoT, JLL Technologies: Given that more than 60% of carbon emissions within our cities typically come from buildings, a growing number of city governments now recognize the urgency to decarbonize their commercial and residential buildings.  Technology is likely to be the biggest catalyst of green progress in the built environment as requirements grow for the mandatory reporting, benchmarking, and auditing of buildings’ energy efficiencies and emissions standards. 

2. In today’s era of high social change and low government confidence, what can city leaders do to build the level of citizen trust and engagement they need to drive future change? What do you see as examples of best practice? 

Kari Aina Eik, Executive Director, United Cities: To gain trust, city leaders need to step up in terms of knowledge, understanding, and communication. Cities don’t need super-heroes, but leaders who are open about the challenges now and involve city stakeholders in meeting these challenges. 

Jayant Kohale, Analytics, Smart Cities, Digital, AI: The biggest challenge for city leaders is trust. There is a huge trust deficit with governments across the globe. In these turbulent times, it’s not easy for city leaders to meaningfully engage stakeholders. The initiatives I have seen having an impact are citizen charters, where a group of citizens interacts with a wider city population, shares pros and cons of new initiatives, and discusses their impact and outcomes. 

Bayan Konirbayev, Chief Digital Officer, Almaty City Government: The main problem in emerging countries is the lack of trust in the government. To address the lack of real information, we launched open data access for depersonalized data sets related to city activities, like economic, social, and land use data. Citizens can use this data to better understand the reasons behind each decision being made by the local government. Another instrument is the budget participatory program, under which citizens prepare proposals for city development and vote for certain projects that the city government will finance.  

Mary Nicol, Director of Policy, Chicago Department of Transportation (CDOT): One way to build trust is to bring community and advocate organizations into the policy-making process. CDOT partnered with the Energy Foundation to provide funding for the Transportation Equity Network (TEN), a coalition of community groups, transportation advocates, and other stakeholders that advocate for racial equity and mobility justice. Through the funding provided, TEN was able to consult and help develop CDOT’s three-year strategic plan. 

Peter Nõu, IT strategist, Uppsala Municipality: This question might not be quite as applicable in Sweden where trust in government is still very high (80+%) albeit falling slowly. We consider transparency to be the most trust building that city government and processes need to accommodate, to further this goal. Adhering to shared standards with regards to KPIs in different sectors will allow for comparisons and help citizens and companies in evaluating our progress. There are many already regulated processes for sharing and potentially amending Plans with citizenry. Development is however needed along the outcome/evaluation dimension, after the city is built, and continues to live and develop with its inhabitants and businesses, neighbors near and far.

Liz Van Dyke, Head of Public Sector, North America, JLL Technologies: Our clients want to create spaces that engage citizens and provide healthier, more collaborative environments. Many have some or all of the IT building blocks in place to facilitate this, such as IWMS systems, reservations systems, and IoT sensors, but often these data points are not well integrated or optimized to produce these outcomes. We’ve found that digitizing the entire real estate portfolio management process, including space management, is foundational to designing compelling, inclusive public spaces.

3. To help cities prepare for a more challenging future, multilateral, national, and regional government bodies are offering funding and grants to local governments. How are cities tapping such funding programs, such as the Biden infrastructure plan in the US or grants for environmental initiatives in Europe? What can cities do to stake their claim?  

Bill Cashmore, Deputy Mayor, Auckland Council: Cluster with other cities and share goals, concepts, and ideas. Be flexible. Source government, federal funding to deliver in the short, medium, and long term. Funding needs to be locked in and not vulnerable to political change. 

Kari Aina Eik, Executive Director, United Cities: There is a gap in knowledge in cities both about how to access these grants and funding and about how to deploy this funding in the context of other initiatives and programs. So much funding is available, but not accessed and much is being deployed without effect. To achieve net-zero cities by the needed deadlines, there is no time for overlap and waste of resources. Holistic cross-sector cooperation is the only way forward. 

Jian Liu, Professor, School of Architecture Tsinghua University: The funding and grants offered by multilateral, national, and regional government bodies should be seen as a kind of development guidance for localities which can be well integrated with local development demands.  

Mary Nicol, Director of Policy, Chicago Department of Transportation: It is critical for city leaders to have a clear vision of the city they are trying to build with and for residents. Chicago has a citywide vision of trails and open spaces that will contribute to a network of community-led green infrastructure projects to promote the health and well-being of residents and visitors. The city is working closely with community stakeholders to plan each project and identify funding for engineering and construction, including funds recently passed through Biden’s infrastructure plan.  

Peter Nõu, IT strategist, Uppsala Municipality: Our city is increasingly aware of national and international funding opportunities. There are signs that Sweden as a whole, wants to and will commit to a more decentralized model with regards to robustness and resilience at all levels of society in terms of crisis. How (if) responsibilities for decision making and action will be redistributed is currently an active area of research inside larger national funding schemes, and cities with foresight are encouraged to take initiatives. Our city of Uppsala has such ambitions and one context where we work is the Viable Cities framework program [https://en.viablecities.se/].

4. Even with greater access to public funding, resource-strapped cities may not have the wherewithal to invest in the smart innovation they need to become future ready. How are cities leveraging corporate, professional, and academic partnerships, as well as working with regional neighbors and local communities, to achieve their goals in these tougher economic times?  

Bill Cashmore, Deputy Mayor, Auckland Council: Cities should Invest in private-sector relationships. Incentivize innovation, promote success, and illustrate positive change. Use real people as examples, average people who have changed their habits and their lives for better results as individuals, families, and communities. 

Kari Aina Eik, Executive Director, United Cities: New structures and processes are established in cities around the globe and there is a lot of information exchange during conferences and in meetings. But what is really missing is real cooperation among cities at concrete levels, and practical sharing of experience. What is needed is joint net-zero projects that are scalable and then shared with cities and regions globally. 

Jayant Kohale, Analytics, Smart Cities, Digital, AI: The best way to deal with this would be to leverage the ecosystem. Learn from each other. Share best practices amongst peers. Some city initiatives could have global impact while some could be local. 

Bayan Konirbayev, Chief Digital Officer, Almaty City Government: The budget for digital development will require a lot of resources, which the city by itself will never be able to cover. Our digital public-private partnership model allows private investors interested in the development of the new forms of business, like marketplaces, new digital services etc., to directly apply for financing from the city government, which will cover 20-30% of expenses, while the rest can come from consumer payments. 

Jian Liu, Professor, School of Architecture Tsinghua University: Becoming future ready or implementing smart innovation may not necessarily imply high tech that relies on funding. It can also be achieved through the application of appropriate technology that is not costly. Finding common values can serve as a solid foundation for cities to work together with corporate, professional, and academic partners, as well as regional neighbors and local communities. 

Mary Nicol, Director of Policy, Chicago Department of Transportation (CDOT): Chicago’s climate action plan calls for 2,500 new public passenger electric vehicle charging stations by 2035. To reach that goal, the city will partner with communities to identify ideal locations for charging stations, with the private sector to make investments in the stations, with the utility company to ensure the grid is ready for the additional electricity demand, and with state and federal governments to ensure there is the financial backing for these large-scale infrastructure investments. 

Clay Pearson, City Manager, City of Pearland, Texas: At the City of Pearland, we are partnering with private investment to get the mobility that is underappreciated, but mandatory. We do that wisely with well-researched strategies on economic development, retail trends and gaps, and workforce needs, in partnership with outside experts that care about giving us executable strategies. We think about where and what we can leverage and where we can partner with public schools, business associations, and not-for-profit organizations to achieve success. We bring a light touch to regulation and tend not to impose top-down aesthetic requirements which can stifle, rather than enhance. 

Peter Nõu, IT strategist, Uppsala Municipality: These collaborative dimensions are very important for the Uppsala Municipality. The organization STUNS (“Sustainable growth in Uppsala; at https://stuns.se/en/) is an almost 40 year old collaboration between public organizations, academia and local corporations. Uppsala also collaborates with other Swedish cities in different areas, and with the Swedish capital of Stockholm with regards to developing the corridor north south between our cities. We will build two new parallel train tracks to a total of four, in the coming decade. Very large residential and commercial developments are being planned as a new part of Uppsala, with yet to be decided super ambitious climate and sustainability goals. Breaking of ground is planned to happen in 2023.

Jeremy Kelly, Global Research Director, City Futures, JLL: The magnitude of the climate change challenge and the urgency with which we need to create a significantly decarbonized economy requires the mobilization of resources across multiple stakeholder groups. Ecosystems of partnerships will be crucial in driving progress, pooling resources and knowledge, sharing or copying best practices, and educating and helping scale technology. There is strong potential to leverage the real estate sector’s intelligence, skills, innovations, and financial acumen to help deliver sustainability goals.

5. City leaders need to make hard decisions on where to invest across urban domains to become future ready. Which urban domains are cities prioritizing for investment over the shorter and longer term? What are they doing to ensure a holistic approach to urban development?  

Kari Aina Eik, Executive Director, United Cities: Top priorities are roads, mobility solutions, health, and energy. For net-zero cities, the focus needs to be turned more to renewables, waste management, water, and food security. In terms of real challenges facing this earth and our cities today, I have not heard of a city that is able to implement a holistic approach and is able to do a radical shift to really meet these challenges. If there is one, please let us know so we can learn and share this with 10,000 other cities in need. 

Jayant Kohale, Analytics, Smart Cities, Digital, AI: Sustainable development is the need of the hour. Cities need to focus on their carbon footprints to be future ready. Sustainable development must be all encompassing and benefitting all stakeholders equally. The priorities are building sustainable transit models, more cycle paths, and public transport. Also, smaller airports, community centers, and hospitals or health care facilities. Technology can play a vital role in helping the city leadership in decision-making. Technology can provide historical data pointers, do prognosis, and provide what-if scenario analysis to help city leaders define the road ahead. 

Bayan Konirbayev, Chief Digital Officer, Almaty City Government: Population growth, especially in the big cities, and the lack of infrastructure funding brings new challenges. Our priorities are first, construction and renovation of infrastructure related to the water and energy supply systems. Our second priority is construction and renovation of social infrastructure (school, kindergartens, hospitals). Our third priority is development of digital infrastructure (telecom infrastructure, data centers, new software solutions with data sources flow). Finally, to create an attractive environment for talent, we are focusing on development of creative industries with funding programs together with methodological support and grants for creative entrepreneurs.  

Jian Liu, Professor, School of Architecture Tsinghua University: As a key component of a city’s support systems, investments in social, civil, and green infrastructure should be a long-term consideration. For the short-term goal of decarbonization, investments in energy infrastructure and green infrastructure should be considered.  

Mary Nicol, Director of Policy, Chicago Department of Transportation: Chicago is currently prioritizing investments in historically under-resourced neighborhoods to create jobs, better housing, and more amenities to foster long-term economic development and neighborhood vitality. The initiative is providing support for small businesses, creating public realm improvements, restoring historic buildings, and fostering equity and resilience where it’s needed most. Through a collaboration among multiple city departments, community organizations, and corporate and philanthropic partners, the city has aligned more than $1.4 billion in public and private investment.  

 Clay Pearson, City Manager, City of Pearland, Texas: At the City of Pearland, we have been combining advanced practical technologies along with the hard traditional infrastructure of roads and trails, water and wastewater plants and pipes, as well as facilities necessary to serve our dynamic and diverse community. A key component is both basic and essential – a fiber communications ring. Atop that is a reliable communications and data system upon which the sensing for everything from rainfall to city vehicle location to traffic volumes can be reported and compiled. Our approach is to have smart people inside and partners outside with a clear IT strategy. That gives us the makings of practical success in improving service delivery, economic opportunities, and trust. 

Andrea Sorri, Segment Business Development, Cities. EMEA, Axis Communications: We have identified three core areas that shape smart, more livable cities and keep citizens positive about the urban experience. The first area is urban mobility solutions to help ensure that city residents and visitors can move freely within the city. The second is environmental monitoring solutions using technology to help cities reach sustainability goals. The third is public safety solutions to support a city’s security and emergency response networks. To achieve these goals, the first step is understanding what your city needs, and how small changes within these areas can help achieve bigger goals. Then, map out how city departments can work together to achieve a common goal. Finally, scale up as needed within the same system. The important part is finding a path that is right for the specific priority. 

Peter Nõu, IT strategist, Uppsala Municipality: Our city has outsourced establishing and running some infrastructure to private sector actors, over the last 20 years. Discussions are emerging on whether it would make sense for us to re-enter, inside the framework allowed by Swedish regulations. The aim would be to become more robust in terms of crisis response, to better control climate impact of establishing and running said infrastructures etc. These are very complex issues with large financial stakes, and will be researched thoroughly. Uppsala is Sweden’s largest (in terms of population) rural municipality as well as being the fourth largest city. To us, planning for all of us at the same time, is the way to balance and make sure that we grow responsibly & sustainably. We live in trying times. A potential global recession might hinder some of our ambitious plans, but we are committed to being transparent with regards to goal setting and transparent in reporting.

Jeremy Kelly, Global Research Director, City Futures, JLL: Decarbonization is increasingly playing a core role in city policy and cities’ operations. However, governments must look beyond carbon and balance decarbonization goals with social equity, affordability, biodiversity, and climate adaptation. The best sustainability strategies embrace real estate and adopt a holistic approach in which the drive towards decarbonization is considered alongside positive social outcomes.

In today’s unpredictable world, resilience is essential for urban future readiness. No city today understands this better than Kyiv, Ukraine’s capital city. Just recovering from the pandemic, Kyiv is now facing even a larger crisis: a fight for survival in the battle with Russia. Kyiv’s experience outlines how future-ready digital technologies can help cities stay resilient even during the worst disasters. 

Building digital capabilities 

Before the war began, Kyiv was already far along in its smart city journey, explains Victoria Itskovych, the city’s deputy CIO. The city had been implementing a wide range of smart initiatives across multiple domains, from transportation and education to health and the environment.  

For citizens, perhaps the most visible initiative was the city’s smartphone app, Kyiv Digital, which offers access to an array of municipal services and information. The app has been very popular: so far, 1.8 million people have downloaded it, more than half of Kyiv’s 2.9 million inhabitants and 7 in 10 of the city’s adults.  

In addition to providing access to online city services, the app furnishes information on public transport schedules and arrivals, as well as electronic ticketing. This includes buses, trolleys, and the Kyiv Metro subway system where you can use either QR-tickets or a travel card stored in the app. Users can top up their travel cards using Apple Pay or Google Pay, or connect a Masterpass wallet to save cards for future purchases.  

The electronic payment system makes it easier for users of public transportation, which number over one million people a day. It also eliminates corruption, according to Itskovych. “It makes sure people’s money goes to the municipal budget,” she says, rather than having cash payments diverted by bus and trolley drivers. 

Kyiv has multi-modal mobility options, including a wide network of electric vehicle charging stations and scooter share. Currently, there are seven different providers of scooters, each with its own app. “Our subsequent release of the city app will integrate all seven providers onto one form, so users can see on a map where the nearest scooter is, and the provider,” says Itskovych. The city’s highly sophisticated smart parking system likewise works through the Kyiv Digital app to track time and handle parking payments, using the phone’s location and the car’s license plate number.  

To accommodate those who don’t have payment cards or a bank account, the city offers physical ways to buy transit tickets and pay for parking in special shops. However, Itskovych says, lack of access to smartphones and bank cards is not much of a problem. “On the national level, a lot of government services are now connected to a banking ID, so now everyone has one,” she says. Similarly, the government has a program to provide smartphones to older citizens and teach them how to use them.  

Planning for and responding to crisis 

In a move that proved to be prescient, before the war Kyiv had begun developing a municipal situation center and platform for coordinating municipality owned units, with a system that individual emergency services could use to record incidents and share information with others. “This system became handy for us during the war,” says Itskovych. Similarly, Kyiv’s citywide network of IoT sensors and more than 7,000 video surveillance cameras, which provide data for advanced video analytics, are playing a critical role in the war against Russian terrorist groups. 

When Russia invaded on February 24th, 2022, Itskovych went straight to the city’s data center, where the Kyiv Digital team had been fending off cyberattacks for several days, with help from outside vendors like Cloudflare. “The municipal data center is also the monitoring center for our video surveillance system, which covers the entire city and nearby,” she says, enabling officials to see what was happening and keep law enforcement and the military informed about incursions from soldiers, tanks—and even groups of spies.  

The team worked to restore online services while sealing off the data center from further attack. It also began adding functionality to Kyiv Digital, including an early warning for air-raids, which works more quickly and has a wider reach than legacy sirens. As some businesses closed and residents lined up to buy basic goods like food and medicines, the team added a function for business owners to report when they were open and had supplies. The app then plots these on a map.  

The team further expanded the app to handle digital control passes for city workers that homeowners could check online, and to collect information for extension of Wi-Fi to air-raid shelters in basements and underground carparks, so that people could get vital information and communicate. “In partnership with 20 different ISP home providers, we covered 815 basement areas where people were during air alerts during the first month or so,” says Itskovych.  

What lies ahead 

Even amid the warfare, Kyiv has not lost sight of its future-ready goals. “One goal for 2025 is to have 60% of administrative services online, with 100% by 2030,” Itskovych notes, which is in line with overall national goals for digital transformation.  

Other goals for 2030 include a sustainable, multimodal mobility system using open-loop payments, and a variety of carbon reduction targets. Petro Olenych, chief digital transformation officer for Kyiv, says that one measure under consideration is an addition to the city’s app that will give users information on their carbon footprint when planning a journey by different transportation modes. 

Kyiv’s experience holds lessons for other cities. One is that urban leaders’ future-ready plans should include building capabilities to cope with disasters and emergencies into their smart technologies and systems. Real-time communications and information are key to resilience. “We have learned from this that any unrealistic scenario can become realistic, and that you have to take this into account in your disaster recovery planning,” says Itskovych. “But you have to focus on the main things that your citizens need to survive—food, medications, water, power, shelter.”   

Petro adds that fitting city plans into those for the wider regional or national critical infrastructure is also crucial when considering emergency scenarios. “With that mindset, everything becomes clear—it’s not about profit generation in the first place, it’s about the well-being of citizens and how we can apply technology to help.”  

As cities around the world continue to reel from the COVID-19 pandemic, climate change, and other disruptions, their highest priority has become to ensure a safe, resilient, and economically stable future for their residents. This has heightened the urgency for cities to become future-ready —smart, sustainable, secure, and fully aligned with changing citizen and business needs.  

ThoughtLab’s fourth urban research program, Building a Future-Ready City, is now being launched, and will provide urban leaders with a complete action plan for meeting the challenges ahead. ThoughtLab asked sponsors and advisors of our program to share their views on how cities can become future-ready. Here is how some of them responded. 

 

1. What are the key characteristics of a future-ready city? How will it need to differ from most cities today?  

Dr. Peter Pirnejad, City Manager, Los Altos Hills, California: Future-ready cities need to be progressive, proactive, and dynamic. They must respond to today’s problems but prepare to solve tomorrow’s as well. Most cities are only focused on yesterday’s problems using yesterday’s methods. 

Prof. Joan E. Ricart, Professor of Strategic Management, IESE, Spain: A future-ready city is characterized by being citizen-centric, with a clear vision and strategy, innovative and digitally transformed, connected and highly collaborative, and investing in adequate infrastructure enabled by data, and in attracting talent. 

Peter Nou, IT Strategist, Smart City Infrastructure & Innovation, Uppsala, Sweden: The future-ready city needs to be open to change. “A city” is an overlapping system of systems, and those need to be understood and analyzed in terms of investment horizons and stakeholders. Most cities today are managed inside multiple verticals, with their own resources, problems, and communities of interests. The future requires more wholistic approaches that build engagement and trust over the long term. This is a difficult journey that cannot be micromanaged but needs to be nurtured, often beyond a normal political term. It is not a tech question per se, but much of the transparency can be mediated by technology and clear goal setting at different levels. 

Bayan Konirbayev, Chief Digital Officer, Almaty, Kazakhstan: A future-ready city has multiple components, including a social layer, an infrastructure layer, and a data layer.  

The social layer is the ability of residents and the city administration to accept changes and experiment with new services and opportunities within the city.  

The infrastructure layer includes telecommunication and ICT infrastructure for the implementation of new IT projects, ready-made data centers, distributed FOCL infrastructure, carpeting with video surveillance cameras, and an Internet of Things platform integrated into housing and communal services. 

The data layer involves having a single standard methodology for managing all city data, including rules for managing data of state bodies and subordinate enterprises. Also needed is a structured public data library or database with differentiated access for private companies and state enterprises. 

If we will rate every city from 1-10 based on those three layers, we will see the differences among cities emerge. Because digitalization itself is not only about new technology implementation but also about preparing citizens (using a change management approach) and mature data governance rules, there should be a balance among the three layers. 

Gianluca Galletto, Managing Director, Technology and Innovation Partnerships, New York City Housing Authority: Accessibility is critical. People of all socio-economic statuses and races will need to access all parts of the city seamlessly without visible or invisible barriers. Other characteristics include lots of public space and green areas including on buildings; totally decarbonized; minimal inequality and zero inequality of opportunities; participatory when it comes to making decisions; empowered by their national or regional governments to do what is needed at a local level (many cities are heavily constrained by their national institutional framework); and in tune with the surrounding suburbs and rural areas.   

Kevin Taylor, Segment Development Manager, Smart Cities, Axis Communications: The primary characteristics of a future-ready city are collaboration, modern communications infrastructure, innovation, and an eagerness to embrace open-architecture solutions.

Collaboration is important because no one local government department or agency has all the skillsets, resources, and funding to go at their challenges alone. Through collaboration, municipalities can leverage force multipliers that will enable all stakeholders to accomplish their mission while avoiding redundant expenditures on overlapping technologies.

Modern communications infrastructure is important because data is the lifeblood of not only future-ready cities, but of Industry 4.0. To make informed decisions, large amounts of data need to be continually transported, archived, and analyzed. Municipalities will have to deploy infrastructure, or leverage cooperative partnerships with third-party owners of infrastructure, to accomplish this affordably.

Innovation is key to building future ready. While local governments should always be citizen-centric, therein avoiding the “technology for the sake of technology” euphemism, cities will have to discover new innovative platforms, solutions, procedures, and policies that most positively impact all members of the community. 

And finally, embracing open-architecture technology is critical in future-ready cities because solutions that serve an entire community will be expected to grow large in scale, and will be expected to assimilate within a city’s technology ecosystem which includes other sub-systems. Sensors will be expected to connect to multiple sub-systems, and data from those sub-systems will be expected to benefit multiple stakeholders. There is no place for proprietary or “closed” systems in the future-ready city. 

 

2. What did the pandemic teach us about the future of cities? What steps should cities be taking now to become future-ready?  

Dr. Peter Pirnejad, City Manager, Los Altos Hills, California: The pandemic taught cities how quickly they can adapt when their survival counts on it and how devastating things can get if they don’t. Cities should take the lessons learned from the pandemic and snap forward and embrace the new normal rather than snap back and settle for the old norms. 

Prof. Joan E. Ricart, Professor of Strategic Management, IESE, Spain: The recent pandemic accelerated the necessary transformation of cities to be more sustainable, resilient, inclusive, equitable, and prosperous, and the need to do things differently to reach this transformation. 

Peter Nou, IT-strategist, Smart City Infrastructure & Innovation, Uppsala, Sweden: The pandemic taught us that communications networks need to be pervasive, robust, and safe to allow for meetings and individual contributions to be made from wherever. We also learned that whatever policies are put into place to halt the spread of infectious agents, the public response and ultimately the effectiveness of the measures rely on community engagement, more than enforcement. Trust and communications cannot only be electronically mediated. In our city, we are studying going towards a fractal design, the 15-minute city with hubs for most functions. Meetings, recycling, package delivery, and more. Finding business models that are community focused and/or driven are a clear objective but not yet implemented. Becoming future-ready is a continuous process, not a fixed state at some point in space and time. 

Prof. Jian Liu, Associate Professor, School of Architecture, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China: The pandemic reminds us that change is constant, and a future-ready city should be resilient and adaptable to constant change. For that, existing cities should be redesigned and renovated in view of constant change, of both nature and human society itself, rather than just following a “blueprint” that is conventionally imagined and designed.  

Bayan Konirbayev, Chief Digital Officer, Almaty, Kazakhstan: The pandemic showed us two things: 1) a city’s supply chain can be disrupted, so it is very important to have alternative supplies; 2) the isolation and vaccination process showed city administrations how hard it is to control their citizens, so for every step change management practices should be adopted. The government needs to understand how to work with people. The first and the most important step should be focused on preparing citizens for new changes, whether positive or negative.  

Gianluca Galletto, Managing Director, Technology and Innovation Partnerships, New York City Housing Authority: Public spaces are critical. Effective communication regarding security and health is critical and was neglected before. Although density will still be there because it’s a major asset to in terms of creativity, productivity, etc., we don’t need lots of office space as we needed before, and we should think of better ways to use the built environment and be able to prosper with a little less density and a better relationship with suburban and rural areas. Inequality is a bad beast. The pandemic disproportionately (and highly so) affected the excluded, the unprivileged, the invisible people who are usually essential to the functioning of a city (for example, if you deported all the 600,000 to 800,000 immigrants without legal status in New York City, the city would collapse.)   

Kevin Taylor, Segment Development Manager, Smart Cities, Axis Communications: The challenges of 2020 relating to the global pandemic and to social unrest revealed to us that the two most pressing issues universally relevant to members with a community are health and wellness and personal safety. Strategic initiatives that deal with long-term topics like environmental impact absolutely are relevant and important, but the biggest threat to not only livability, but to survivability, within cities are the immediate needs of today. 

The last two years taught us that when large segments of the community feel their immediate health and safety is either in jeopardy or is deemed to be of reduced value and importance, civility breaks down and cities get burned. For cities of today or cities of the future, the most important thing local governments can provide is peace of mind that individuals can live, work, learn, and play within their community because it is a healthy and safe environment. 

 

3. Which technologies will play a key role in the city of the future? How will these technologies transform urban environments?  

Dr. Peter Pirnejad, City Manager, Los Altos Hills, California: Hybrid and virtual government has proven to not only be effective but desired by elected officials, staff, and constituents alike. Access to services and government has never been so easy. Government buildings have become institutions that provide a venue to engage in work that is more effective in person rather than online. Government buildings will be transformed from being where work is done to where people can share and exchange ideas to improve our institutions. 

Prof. Joan E. Ricart, Professor of Strategic Management, IESE, Spain: All digital technologies need to play a role in the digital transformation of cities. The smart use of data allows the implementation of innovative ways to run future-ready cities. 

Peter Nou, IT-strategist, Smart City Infrastructure & Innovation, Uppsala, Sweden: IoT (sensing the environment and flows of people and materials) is the next technology that will inform us about the pulse of the city. Monitoring city processes will inform city leaders and organizations about constraints, risks, progress towards goals, and more. Sensing infrastructure requires access to pervasive digital infrastructure, and our city is in the process of taking a step forward, potentially owning our own black fiber network that we will lease to anyone at transparent rates or utilize ourselves if the need arises. 

Prof. Jian Liu, Associate Professor, School of Architecture, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China: At least at this moment, digital technology is playing the most significant role in transforming urban environments and will play a key role in the city of the future, by changing the way of life of human beings in the four primary aspects of daily life:  residence, work, leisure, and transportation. Transportation technology will play a significant role in transforming urban environments by changing the mode of travel and the pattern of mobility.  

Gianluca Galletto, Managing Director, Technology and Innovation Partnerships, New York City Housing Authority: New forms of IT to create easier access and communication flows between city government and citizens. Internet of Things for sure. At the same time, better privacy technology and policies to prevent the digitalization of everything becomes a new “big brother” and creates all sorts of other problems – including new forms of backlash and social and political tensions. Retrofit technology for building decarbonization and new infrastructure to provide clean energy and clean mobility. 

Kevin Taylor, Segment Development Manager, Smart Cities, Axis Communications: No single technology, product, or vendor can provide everything a city needs. An “ecosystem” approach is required. Because cities increasingly are relying on data and analytics to make informed decisions, it is reasonable to assume some technologies most critical to the future-ready city are IoT edge sensors like deep-learning enabled cameras, and emerging communications networks like 5G millimeter wave wireless. 

These are foundational technology categories for future-ready cities that enable other platforms like digital twins and visualization dashboards. Additionally, because these foundational technologies also offer real-time benefits, they can be used by traffic management stakeholders as well as within the police/fire/ambulatory emergency response workflow. 

 

4. Which cities today offer good examples of future-ready thinking and solutions? What lessons can be learned from them?  

Dr. Peter Pirnejad, City Manager, Los Altos Hills, California: Rather than looking at cities that offer good examples, we need to look at case studies that offer insights to the future. Take, for example, the town of Los Altos Hills, which saw a major increase in crime. Rather than hire more deputies to patrol its  streets, the town partnered with a vendor that could use AI and automatic license plate readers (ALPRs) to track stolen cars coming into the town. As a result, we saw a significant decrease in crime rates. The lesson is that we cannot solve yesterday’s problems with yesterday’s approaches. We need to be progressive, proactive, and dynamic in our response to the urban problems of today. 

Prof. Jian Liu, Associate Professor, School of Architecture, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China: In China, Hangzhou and Chengdu are two cities that can offer good examples of future-ready thinking and solutions. Hangzhou is particularly characterized by the popularization of digital technologies in the city’s social-economic development and city management, as well as its citizens’ daily life, with consideration to the interaction between the city and its surrounding nature. Chengdu is particularly characterized by the attitude of its citizens to life and nature, with good integration of the city into its surrounding environment, and the broad involvement of citizens in city development and city management through community building.  

Gianluca Galletto, Managing Director, Technology and Innovation Partnerships, New York City Housing Authority: Copenhagen for sure. They have a 13K km of heat networks, and heating uses only 3% of fossil energy. Paris with its increased green spaces, bike lanes, and a real push to become a 15-minute city. New York City with participatory budgeting, ranked choice voting for elections, public-private collaboration for a variety of economic and social programs, strong data-driven policymaking (including policing), extremely tough climate laws, and a series of public and private investment (massive) to become a net zero city. For example, local law 97 imposes strict emission limits on buildings with steep million-dollar fines if it’s not respected, and gas has been banned from all new construction from 2023. There are plans to retrofit buildings, programs to create jobs in the green economy, and massive investments in new renewable infrastructure.  

Kevin Taylor, Segment Development Manager, Smart Cities, Axis Communications: The challenges faced by cities vary infinitely depending on factors such as, but not limited to, cultural, socio-economic, geographical, and geo-political circumstances. In recent years, we have witnessed cities employ innovative approaches using emerging technology in public safety, urban mobility management, and environmental sensing and monitoring. 

For more information, including cases studies, on cities that leverage Axis Communications products and technologies to address the challenges facing their communities, please visit https://www.axis.com/customer-story.

 

5. Why is a study on building a roadmap to becoming future ready so important to undertake now?  

Dr. Peter Pirnejad, City Manager, Los Altos Hills, California: There has never been a time when government has faced so many obstacles that challenge the very foundation of democracy and our ability to govern. Everything from the institutional knowledge being lost as baby boomers leave the workforce to the loss of qualified replacements due to the great resignation. Even the people we govern are engaging in ways that make it difficult to distinguish the vocal minority from the silent majority. Today, government is being challenged as opposing sides get rooted in their objections while taking aim at the institutions set up to foster a democratic resolve rather than the opposition that they wish to convert. We are seeing a loss in faith and trust in government institutions and their ability to govern while we are experiencing a rise in conspiracy theories and alternative facts. Government needs to understand the changes in the people they govern and adapt their systems to respond in more effective and productive ways. 

Peter Nou, IT-strategist, Smart City Infrastructure & Innovation, Uppsala, Sweden: In Europe, war in Ukraine demands our attention at present. At the same time, world leaders are losing focus on climate change, a bigger longer-term issue. Younger generations understand that the need to live a greener life. But only if you walk or bike, not if you are a single driver of a large SUV. There are so many conflicting goals. Pandemic response around the world varied and highlighted different shortcomings at different scales. Many simultaneous crises at different time scales make for so many potential conflicts. Between green and black. Between young and old. Between future and past. Between political class and regular folks. Pandemics, wars, climate tipping points. Cities are where most folks live and where most discussion needs to take place to agree on the path forward. No city’s path will be identical to that of other cities. But the clear story telling of what choices are made, and why, will inform us all.  

Prof. Jian Liu, Associate Professor, School of Architecture, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China: Today, human society might be amid the most critical transition since the Industrial Revolution, except in period of wars, in view of the remarkable changes in the climate, environment, ecology, economy, society, demographics, politics, and technology, etc. It is important to take actions to actively respond to these changes to make cities more resilient and adaptable for the future. 

Bayan Konirbayev, Chief Digital Officer, Almaty, Kazakhstan: We need an understanding of the steps to take, the responsibility of various people, and the relevant KPIs. The roadmap is something we need to have, but together with that it is important to stay agile in order to change your plans according to the  geopolitical situation or technological developments. Big cities have 20, 30, or 40-year development plans, but the world is changing frequently. 

Gianluca Galletto, Managing Director, Technology and Innovation Partnerships, New York City Housing Authority: We are at a historical and dramatic inflection point in terms of how the entire planet can survive, and cities are the place where we need to lead the way. They are the main problem and the main solution to climate change, which is an existential threat for all the planet, no one excluded. The only super ubiquitous threat. They are the place where pragmatism is more important than political partisanship and they can provide examples of (more) effective governance. 

Kevin Taylor, Segment Development Manager, Smart Cities, Axis Communications: Cities are dynamic environments, and the speed of change they are facing has increased to unprecedented levels. A byproduct of this change is uncertainty. Municipal stakeholders are charged with the responsibility of doing what is best for their community while being good stewards of public funds. It is difficult for these stakeholders to perform these responsibilities in the face of so much uncertainty. 

Third-party independent research like this project conducted by ThoughtLab are important information sources local government stakeholders can look to for guidance, for best practices, for encouragement, and for inspiration.