To date it’s perhaps fair to say that the smart cities movement has seen more expectation than reality, but there are signs of progress being made, albeit with some cities somewhat further ahead than others. A new online application from Siemens highlights the various state of readiness of several cities around the world.
The Atlas of Digitilization assesses the impact of technology on urban life around the world in areas such as mobility, sustainability and opportunity. The atlas is based on data across 21 indicators that has been collected from Buenos Aires, Dubai, Johannesburg, London, Los Angeles, and Taipei.
This analysis allowed a Digital Readiness Score to be provided for each city that encompassed things such as smart transport systems, digital governance services and internet connectivity. Siemens believe that the score reflects the digital maturity of each city, and London appears to lead the way.
//https://atlas.dc.siemens.com/
From this analysis a Digital Readiness Score has been defined, considering areas such as smart electricity and transport systems, internet connections and digital governance services. The score reveals the current level of maturity of each city’s digital infrastructure, and its preparedness for a connected future.
“The Atlas of Digitalization gives us an insight to the current status of digitalization in global cities, and the data tells us London has already made excellent progress. We hope the Atlas will inspire new ways of thinking to shape all the smart cities of tomorrow and realize the global potential of City 4.0,” Siemens explain.
Digital cities
The analysis incorporates factors such as greenhouse gas emissions, innovation and time spent in traffic to enable each city to receive a Digital Potential Score, which is designed to reflect the potential for each city to grow its digital capabilities. Siemens believe that the Readiness and Potential scores collectively illustrate the different capacities a city has, and where it can improve in future.
London scores particularly highly in areas such as the congestion charge and Ultra Low Emission Zone, which significantly reduce nitrogen oxide emissions in the city. The Atlas also provides a number of examples of where London can improve, including better mobile internet speeds and IoT-based services, such as vehicle-to-everything communications.
“As part of the Mayor of London’s ‘Smarter London Together’ plan to transform London into the smartest city in the world, the Greater London Authority has set out how they want to collaborate with the capital’s boroughs and services, from Transport for London to the National Health Service: working more effectively with the tech community, universities and other cities to make their vision a reality,” Siemens say.
The Atlas allows visitors to interact with each city and explore the data in more depth to examine the unique challenges and opportunities presented in each area. It’s a nice resource to help us keep track of the progress of smart city technologies, and to compare progress between cities.
