Developing Sustainable Cities

Developing Sustainable Cities
Talal Abu- Ghazaleh
A fundamental shift in our existence as a human race is underway as a result of the internet and the fourth industrial revolution technologies that are revolutionizing the world. The information age is truly upon us and is expanding at an exponential rate, leading to the development of digital societies and linking global communities in ways that were never previously possible.
Technologies such as artificial intelligence, internet of things (IoT) and big data are crucial in redefining the way in which cities operate; helping to deliver cheaper, fairer, more transparent services to a growing population in the face of increased urbanization. Our cities are at the center of prosperity and provide the most opportunities, attracting intra country migration which poses significant challenges in planning, governing and running them. In recent times, cities have borne the brunt of the outfall from the COVID epidemic but have remained as flagships of hope and confidence, providing homes, employment, social and religious facilities as well and health and economic support in a time of uncertainty.
The use of technology is fundamental in the bid to develop sustainability in a manner which limits impact to the environment. The UN has called this the Decade of Action where serious work needs to be put in to accelerate global efforts towards meeting UN Sustainable Develop Goals (SDGs) by 2030. Greater leadership, smart technologies, action on city levels and empowering people are key to generating the movement required to create real and long lasting change. 
Issues such as population increase, climate change and now the COVID epidemic are real causes of concern as the joint effect they are having on our cities is serious, aggravating social and economic fissures and putting greater demands on municipalities to serve a growing population in a sustainable manner.  The only way these challenges can be met is to instigate change by leveraging technology to develop smart, sustainable cities. Cities need to have dynamic frameworks to operate within with technical and legislative experts and the financial backing to meet the goals that sustainable development initiatives have put forth.
Over the last twenty or so years there has been a trend for cities to start smart city initiatives to deliver more efficient, equitable services to their citizens. These initiatives have seen varying degrees of success, with some world class implementations in countries such as Singapore, with others failing miserably. What started off as a utopia prophesized by many technocrats has actually been a difficult concept to materialize at the grass roots level. 
This deserves to be revisited in order to refocus global efforts as time is not on our side and there are real issues that need to be addressed. Developing sustainable cities is not a technological issue but rather one of planning, implementation and governance. 
It is vitally important for cities to have comprehensive strategy at the onset in order to properly drive a smart city agenda. This will assist in suitably identify the needs of a city as well as the required technology, infrastructure and governance needed to establish a smart city ecosystem. This stage is crucial to get right for a successful foundation to be built as there is no one size fits all. There should be an independent team responsible for managing this strategy and its implementation that should be established as a body autonomous from the government in power. This will ensure longevity of the smart city project and warrant consistent improvement in its overall goals. 
As well as having a clear direction and goal, this unit should consist of a project management team with experience in tackling governmental and private entities, a strong technical team that understands technology with skilled contract negotiators, experienced finance and legal team, individuals well-versed in change management, marketing experts as well as specialists in delivering awareness and  education. Having cross-functional teams are fundamental to success.
Data is the fuel that powers Smart Cities. All other elements are supportive structures, allowing data to be gathered, processed and acted upon to deliver smart services to citizens. This comes at a price and requires significant investment in identifying and classifying data, categorizing the legal implications of data ownership and developing underlying technology infrastructures that can only be recouped over time. A spirit of data sharing across departments and governmental entities must be encouraged for the greater good and pragmatic data protection regulation must be in place to avoid abuse and promote trust.
City budgets are traditionally dedicated to providing essential services and quite often the money isn’t there to invest in technological infrastructure required for smart cities to be established, which is an even more pressing issue during this period of COVID. This is where the private sector comes in as they have the equity and the needed technical expertise. Public-private partnerships are therefore important to the initiation and longevity of any smart city program. 
To transact effectively in this new ecosystem, central management and provisioning of services is key, as well as providing users with a digital identity through which citizens can engage with all smart services in a seamless manner. This includes technical factors such as the implementation of single sign-on (SSO) to provide a seamless experience for citizens where all their transactions can be logged and tracked with easy management. This requires service integration between providers in order to enable such functionality, as well as hosting the services through a secure network that accepts popular forms of e-payment as well as cash.
The introduction of smart services requires a detailed review of current policies and inevitably the implementation of new ones to cover advancements in technologies. Cutting-edge areas such as AI or autonomous vehicles will require feedback of experts in order to understand the implications of such technology and how this can be effectively steered. Policy development requires input from multiple stakeholders and cross-disciplinary experts as services become dependent on one another to work in a symbiotic fashion to deliver the improvement. Policies need to be developed prior to any implementation to ensure that effective governance and transparency are in place.
Any smart city must also have a comprehensive awareness program to inform citizens about the smart services available and training programmes in place to make sure they can use them. Citizens are core to the success and longevity of smart cities as they are both users of its services as well as the workforce that develop, run and offer them. This means having well-trained staff who can assist citizens whether online, on the telephone or in person to access the services. Cities must actively engage with citizens in order for everyone to benefit from available services, regardless of computer literacy.
I believe that technology based sustainable cities are achievable for all of us. Many cities have excelled in securing gains from which we must learn. The expertise is available meaning we do not need to reinvent the wheel and barriers to progression must be eliminated. 
I have discussed at length the development smart cities in my new book “The Inevitable Digital Future”, available in both English and Arabic which I hope proves useful in developing sustainable cities.
We must work closer together if we are to achieve a greener, more sustainable world. We commonly share this planet with our success lying in a joint global effort to achieve sustainability.