Smart Planning & ICT

Large cities are becoming more complex (due to increasing urbanization) and require even more sophisticated systems to control salient daily operations that keep the city running. In many cities, timely data on transportation, weather conditions and other measurements is always available. Thus, planners can react immediately on issues that rise from the timely data. Example of timely data that is available for public is available at citydashboard.org which presents accurate information on large cities like London. Indeed, we have seen a revolution of information and communication technology (ICT). In other words, our world is increasingly coded.

Historically, planners have gathered information by carrying out small sample surveys. Today, smart planning is available thanks to big data which can be gathered by direct surveillance, automated systems and volunteered projects (Kitchin, 2014); automated systems include calculators that measure usage of transportation systems, surveillances can be carried out through internet and volunteered data can be gathered by projects such as MyLA 2050 (see the third blog text). Big data gathered by using these methods has the following features:

1. It is huge in volume and high in velocity; 
2. It is exhaustive and diverse in variety;
3. It is fine-grained in resolution;
4. It is flexible and relational in nature (Kitchin, 2014, p. 3).

A good example of big data is Facebook: it indeed is huge in volume and exhaustive. It is fine-grained: we can pick an individual and find out their favorite food and relationship status. It is timely and updated all the time. Consequently, Facebook fulfills all the features of big data mentioned above.

Smart planning by exploiting big data has also a number of disadvantages that can be really harmful and make a city vulnerable to failures of technology. For example, electronic systems can be hacked which can cause traffic jams and even dangerous accidents. In addition, it has been pointed out that technology enables continuous monitoring of every citizen which threatens individual privacy.

However, smart planning and exploitation of ICT have a lot of benefits: it makes projecting easier and enables better policy making which in turn can improve the quality of life in certain regions. It increases transparency and citizen participation, and stimulates growth, innovation, and creativity. Finally, it can improve services delivery.

References

City Dashboard 2014, ’London’, viewed 9 November 2014, < http://citydashboard.org/london/>

Kitchin, R 2014, ‘The real-time city? Big data and smart urbanism’, GeoJournal, vol. 79, no. 1, p. 1-14.