Opinions

Yanbu has used Huawei’s Intelligent Traffic Management system to make a smarter, safer and better city, writes Thamer Anwar Noori, Royal Commission Yanbu

Open and interoperable data models will help cities speed up the deployment of smart technologies, writes Stephane Dejean, Chief Marketing Officer at Kerlink.

By integrating technology into the landscape, data can be collected in a non-intrusive way and help to inform how public space responds to the citizens that use it, says Neil Manthorpe, associate director of design at Atkins.

Strategies must take a holistic approach encompassing people, institutions, structures and operations, say Clint Vince, founder of Dentons’ Smart Cities and Communities Think Tank, and Jennifer Morrissey, counsel at Dentons.

More cities must ramp up their climate ambition and deliver urgent action, fast, says Kyra Appleby, Global Director of Cities, States and Regions at CDP.

Smart city projects must move away from the standard applications that many focus on and make a "technological leap", says Paul Moorby, CEO and founder of Chipside, a specialist software development company providing products and services to local and regional government traffic authorities in the UK.

A simple way to control personal data could foster greater trust around smart city initiatives and open up a discussion around what citizens really find valuable – an extension of participatory budgeting, giving people a say in how they ‘spend’ their data.

Trust is emerging as the number-one challenge when implementing smart city projects.