Collaboration, Creativity and Planning Will Define Smart Cities

The rise of the smart city will rely on the ability of stakeholders to collaborate, engage citizens and act on data. Partnerships are hard at work and planning is under way to overcome the legacy of siloed services, focus on integrated systems that will ultimately be more adept at delivering critical services, empower communities and elevate our quality of life.

From Barcelona, Spain, to Boston and San Diego to Singapore, lofty conceptualization has given way to tangible advancements that harness the power of information and communications networks across connected systems. Analytics tools give leaders the power to rationalize costs, benefits and risks of project options against multiple scenarios and stakeholder objectives. The smart city concept is truly one of an ecosystem, driven by partners who develop roadmaps that define, and ultimately enable, the smart city vision.

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These ecosystems mirror those found in nature; richer information supports more diverse and more effective strategies and behaviors. But such a panoramic approach has not yet fully ignited a smart city revolution. Many cities and utilities remain on the sidelines, kept there by perceptions that smart city technologies are distant and expensive.

Each of those barriers can be overcome by carefully considering some key components of a smart city.