The urban revolution that began in the 21st century has led over 90% of Israel’s population to live in urban centers which are growing at an unprecedented rate. This phenomenon creates new and significant challenges for cities, with most of the responsibility for the daily lives of their residents resting on the shoulders of the local authorities and those who lead them.
Israel is one of the world leaders in the trend of transitioning from rural to urban environments. Forecasts predict a continued trend of migration, convergence and population growth in urban environments in Israel, as well as globally.
This phenomenon only seems to intensify and with it, various challenges and complexities involved in running a modern city including:
- Increase in the density in urban spaces and formation of traffic & logistics bottlenecks
- Increased loading on urban infrastructure
- “Built-in” lack of resources
- Increased energy consumption
- Extreme climatic events
- Spread of epidemics
- Terrorist incidents & violent crimes
- Increasing cyber threats at individual and community levels
To prepare and optimally manage all of the challenges and complexities associated with managing a modern city, cities must transition to smart city models based on critical motifs including; safe, sustainable, digital, learning, and efficient cities.
What is a smart city?
A smart city is not limited to installing various technological solutions, rather it is an approach, or “worldview” and choosing an appropriate model for city management.
There are many models of smart cities in the world today, which define themselves in different ways. One thing they all have in common – smart cities embrace technology as a key component for innovation, efficiency, and improving urban systems and more importantly – they all place their residents, and their resident’s needs at the center.
"Smart city" is a broad strategic concept and approach based on a deep understanding of systems including technologies, planning, and the socio-economic makeup of the city. This approach allows the integration of urban concerns, which until now were addressed on an individual and more isolated basis, such as personal security, public resilience, business continuity, infrastructure planning, management and security of information systems, urban energy management,
municipal waste, municipal water, and sewage management, The municipal education system, and more.
The Smart City project will include, among others, relating to the following issues:
- How do you drive renewal and growth processes in the city?
- How do you create a partnership with the residents of the city?
- How do you create a partnership between all the entities that manage the city?
- How do you properly combine education, inclusion, and diversity at the community and municipal levels?
- How do you best integrate different technologies in the city?
- How do you optimize and prioritize the existing resources in the city?
- What threats does the city face? For which of them is the city prepared?
- What is the urban uniqueness of the city?
- How do you create attraction to a city?
- How do you create strong, up-to-date, and relevant branding? (For example, Tel Aviv – "City without a break")
An ideal smart city contains 5 significant components, intertwined with each other:
- Safe City
- Digital City
- Sustainable City
- Efficient City
- City of Learning
Proper strategic reference and planning for these fields and integration between them are the key to proper understanding and planning of a smart city in the modern age.
Elements has extensive experience in advising and accompanying municipalities and local councils in the process of implementing the "Smart City" model. For more details, please contact: 054-4510982 072-2650145
A safe city
The safe city deals with areas of residents' safety & security and the city's functioning in various emergencies, to provide physical security for residents against crime, terrorism, epidemics, natural disasters, and more.
Models for safe cities combines several parameters:
- Preparation, damage reduction and rapid response to emergencies occurring in the city. These crises can result from nature or accidents such as extreme weather events, earthquakes, hazardous materials mishaps, pandemics, or other causes.
- Build & develop a capability to manage urban crises, business / functional continuity and recovery.
- Eradicate physical & verbal violence & terrorist incidents
- Prevent and manage Cyber Events – IT \ OT \ IoT.
- Eliminate vandalism.
- Prevent traffic offenses, road violence and accidents.
- Supervision & management of traffic and parking
- Supervision of construction/signage, trespassing and other anomalies that violate municipal legislation and/or harm urban safety.
The objective in the safe city model, which is part of the smart city concept, is to build a unified system that can address not only security and emergency aspects but also administrative, operational, and logistical matters as well..
The core of the safe city in this model is a municipal management, monitoring and control center, in which all data will be routinely collected as well as during emergencies. A center where decision-making will take place and from which clear guidelines will emerge for municipal, resident and non-municipal partners.
Building a strategic plan for a safe city, within the framework of the smart city, is an opportunity for the local authority and its residents to build a safer life in cooperation, as well as an opportunity for the authority to demonstrate its ability to provide security and leverage insights from data collection and interpretation.
A digital city
Efficient data collection is acute and critical to any organization, but extracting insights from the information collected is several times more expensive than its collection. Local authorities cannot be left behind and in recent years many have undergone processes of digital transformation- the process of turning them into digital cities.
The "Digital City" constitutes the communication and information infrastructure in the smart city model, and incorporates several key guiding principles:
- Assimilation of advanced technologies to improve the city. For example – technologies for regulating traffic, garbage removal, infrastructure repair, vegetation care.
- Online governance – the transfer of municipal services and the administrative connection between the residents and the local government to the digital arena.
- Building the ability to integrate the information in one place and the ability to extract relevant information from it.
- Establishment of municipal control and management centers during normal and emergency conditions.
- Information backup and restoration capabilities during routine and emergency periods.
- Upgrading online municipal services.
- Encouraging the use of apps or a smart resident card, which provide information, benefits, and services.
- Strengthening the connection with the resident, through social networks and public opinion polls.
- Establishing a capability to deal with cyber events.
- Protecting the privacy and security of information.
- Involving residents in the creation and use of information.
The incorporation of the digital city model, and at its core, the urban digital infrastructure, is a significant component of a city's ability to shape itself as a Smart City.
The urban digital infrastructure collects and analyzes information and is a key tool in modern city management capability. Building the ability to create a digital city is not only a management tool but also a community tool whose role is to strengthen the connection between the municipality and the residents while achieving a collaborative and transparent process that contributes to more efficient, qualitative construction and management.
At the same time, it is important to remember that sometimes cities "sin" when defining the technological layer as the essence of the Smart City. The most common mistake among cities is to place a leading system or technology and environment in an attempt to shape the urban perception into a smart city.
In the modern age, cities need to internalize that technology is not the goal but rather the means to fulfillment. The goals are set for the city at the strategic and tactical management levels. Therefore, the right starting point to combine technological means should be – how technology and the introduction of Smart City systems.can promote the quality of life of the resident and the municipality.
The Sustainable City
The Sustainable City focuses on reducing the burden on the city's infrastructure through an attempt to achieve a responsible and ecological balance and co-existence between human activity and the environment.
The “sustainable city” is not just a slogan, but is considered to be a core component of the modern Smart City.
The role of the Sustainable City in the Smart City is the adoption of social, environmental, and green approaches while implementing programs such as:
- Streamlining and expanding the use of existing public spaces – e.g. sidewalks and bicycle paths, which will be built at the expense of existing transport routes and streets.
- Energy efficiency in the urban space, urban facilities and infrastructure
- Encouraging the transition to alternative, green and economical energy solutions
- Strengthening the involvement of urban communities in living/recycling and more.
- Changing the culture of individual consumption and encouraging a cooperative economy within the urban / neighborhood framework.
- Expanding the Authority's investments in forestry and urban agriculture – establishing forests and parks, public gardens, community gardens, encouraging green roofs, and more.
- Establishment of municipal recycling centers and encouraging reuse of various raw materials.
- Green construction – construction of new neighborhoods based on green standards and with green and friendly materials to the environment.
- Shading of hiking trails, sports, and playgrounds.
- Transition the use of electric vehicles (service vehicles) and promotion of the public transportation system.
A sustainable city works for fair, efficient, and responsible use of the various infrastructures and resources at its disposal, while taking responsibility for managing the ecological balance in its area, improving the quality of life of its residents, and preserving the environment for the future generations.
The efficient city
The efficient city is based on various efficiency plans, the purpose of which is to offer a series of measures and actions for the intelligent use of existing infrastructure and resources and to achieve savings in the consumption of various resources.
These programs should also include actions related to the technological side, such as installing systems and accessories of various kinds, and actions related to the educational side, such as assimilating behavioral changes and promoting a sustainable lifestyle among the municipality's management, employees and residents. This process of change must be carried out without compromising the quality and level of services provided by the municipality to its residents.
The "Efficient City" advocates continuous improvement, and builds continuous optimization processes aimed at:
- Proper positioning and utilization of existing resources in the city.
- Achieving economic savings, reflected in the local authority budget.
- Improving the quality of service provided to the residents.
- Consolidation of municipal projects and resources.
The process of urban efficiency can be reflected, among other things, in the following issues:
- Energy efficiency – According to studies, the process of streamlining electricity expenses can save a local authority an amount ranging from 10-20% of the total electricity consumption of the city, without a financial investment.
- Efficiency, sorting and collection of garbage – separation, and reuse of waste.
- Adoption of green attitudes and standards.
- Adoption of international standards relevant to the city.
- Definition of the "Municipal Service Charter" according to the following criteria:
– Defining priorities for handling various events in the city
– Setting time event handling for crises and malfunctions.
– Integral monitoring system and visual reporting of repair of faults.
– Performance monitoring of the tasks assigned to the care of the various departments.
– Providing the resident with the ability to track the status of the reported incident.
- Establishment of a digital inquiry and production mechanism and creation of organizational memory for the benefit of dealing with recurring failures.
- Establishment of a mechanism that examines bureaucratic processes and attempts to reduce and streamline them.
The streamlining process is an ongoing process that includes learning, monitoring, and control processes, to lead the city to maximum efficiency, as part of the process of becoming a Smart City.
City of learning
The city of learning is one of the major objectives that the city needs to strive for in the modern age. The role of the city of learning is to be a place where education and training are important and vital to the city and its residents, no less than their infrastructure, welfare, and security.
In the past, the city addressed traditional mechanisms of formal education in kindergarten and school networks and informal education that included classes, community centers and youth movements.
In the modern age, new vehicles are developing: the “third sector”, the community, and various social media.
The new methodology of city learning in recent years is learning and harnessing the resources inherent in the community – such as knowledge, social networks, environmental assets, and financial assets – to enable residents and organizations in the city to develop skills, acquire knowledge, and streamline urban processes.
For example, in terms of education, the local authority can create a model of "municipal pedagogy" to lead the education of all children towards a future that addresses 21st-century challenges. In addition, in the modern age education, community and values are multi-age mechanisms. At retirement age, one finds themself interested in contributing to the community, various studies, and social action.
A Smart City understands the global change processes and knows how to address the challenge of the resident's personal development and growth throughout all stages of his life in the city (from infancy to old age) and remain in the program for the added value for its residents. The Smart City takes responsibility for the learning and growth processes of its residents and encourages them to develop and fulfill themselves according to their unique abilities, for the community in which they live and to the aspirations and goals of the city.
A smart city – in summary
The smart city approach in the modern age requires the successful integration of urban disciplines, which until now dealt with individuals, such as personal security and public resilience, urban planning, information systems, energy management, waste management, infrastructure management, management and promotion of education.
Until recent years, many plans for smart cities have been developed primarily by consultants familiar with technologies applied in smart cities, with specific focus only on the technological application and not on the overall vision of the entire urban space.
Today, more and more cities in the world are realizing that the basis for the whole process is writing a policy concept after a process of clarifying and analyzing the needs relevant to each city and based on building a strategic plan for the Smart City. The plan needs to be based on an in-depth understanding of the technological, spatial planning, and socio-economic makeup of the city.
Elements has extensive experience in advising and accompanying municipalities and local councils in the process of implementing the "Smart City" model.
For more details, please contact: 054-4510982 or 072-2650145
