“The Cities of the 21st century are the largest sites of human settlement today, and are increasingly acting as critical nexus points of social, economic, ecological and technological change”
- United Nations Environment Program (UNEP)
Cities and its Challenges
A city is a microcosm of the major challenges and opportunities facing the planet today—intensified and accelerated. Here, all man-made systems come together and interact with one another.
Four key global trends that is driving change in city development
• Trend #1: Urbanization is straining infrastructure
• Trend #2: Resource constraints demand efficiency
• Trend #3: Competition between cities is increasing
• Trend #4: New technologies are driving urban innovation
Urbanisation - Straining City Infrastructure
• The global population is now predominantly city-dwelling, as a result demand is increasing for urban infrastructure investment
• In 2008 for the first time in history the urban Population equalled the rural population of the world
• By 2030 this number is expected to swell from 3.3bn to 5bn people.
• India is expected to witness an increase in urban population from 377 million in 2011 to 600 million (roughly twice the current population of the United States) in 2031.
• With an urban population of 31%, India is at a point of transition where the pace of urbanization will speed up till it reaches about 60 – 65%
• Given these numbers, the country is expected to have around 68 cities with population of more than 1 million by 2030.
• This is the opportunity to reap twin benefits of young demographics and urbanization.
71% of CO2emissions are from cities
• Cities have a huge pull on the world’s finite global resources (fossil fuels, water etc);
• Cities are major consumers and polluters. Despite only occupying 2% of land, cities today account for over two-thirds of the world’s energy consumption.
• This energy use translates into 19.8 Gt of CO2 emissions from cities — roughly 71% of global energy-related CO2 emissions.
• By 2030 the share of cities in global CO2 emissions is expected to rise to 76%
Cities Adding to GDP
• Just like companies compete for customers, cities are increasingly competing to attract the best talent, and to attract businesses. Major urban areas today are economic giants.
• The top 5 urban economies (Toyko, NYC, Los Angeles, London and Chicago) are having to increasingly compete with emerging economy cities.
• As this league table shows, by 2025 Sao Paulo, Mexico City, Shanghai, and Buenos Aires will rise higher in the GDP rank – ranking 6th, 7th, 9th and 10th respectively.
• And in 11th place will be Mumbai rising from 29th place in 2008.
• The center of gravity of the earth’s urban landscape is shifting decisively, and at speed - moving south and east – to China, India and Latin America.
Cities are referred to as the “engines of economic growth”
• While the urban population is currently around 31% of the total population, it contributes over 60% of India’s GDP.
• It is projected that urban India will contribute nearly 75% of the national GDP in the next 15 years.
• It is for this reason that cities are referred to as the “engines of economic growth”
New technologies are driving urban innovation
• The final trend, is the growing use of technology within cities
• The penetration of broadband is increasing around the world,
• People are increasingly acting like sensors
• Citizens are participating in the design of their city environments; acting as ‘prosumers’ (both producers and consumers)
• Cities have become more popular and the internet has improved city life
• India’s BB penetration is just 2%
• 10% rise in BB connections lead to 1.3% rise in GDP
Hence, Cities require smarter solutions
• The systems are under increasing environmental, social and economic pressures
• For sustainable prosperity, the systems need to be managed optimally
• The systems need to become smarter
Smart solutions are instrumented, interconnected and intelligent
What is Smart City?
Definitions of Smart City
The UK Department of Business, Innovation and Skills considers smart cities a process rather than as a static outcome, in which increased citizen engagement, hard infrastructure, social capital and digital technologies make cities more livable, resilient and better able to respond to challenges.
The British Standards Institute defines it as “the effective integration of physical, digital and human systems in the built environment to deliver sustainable, prosperous and inclusive future of its citizens”.
IBM defines a smart city as “one that makes optimal use of all the interconnected information available today to better understand and control its operations and optimize the use of limited resources”.
CISCO defines smart cities as those who adopt scalable solutions that take advantage of information and communications technology (ICT) to increase efficiencies, reduce costs and enhance the quality of life”.
Wikipedia defines a city as Smart when investments in human and social capital and traditional (Transport) and modern (ICT) communications infrastructure fuel sustainable economic development and a high quality of life, with a wise management of natural resources, through participatory action and engagement (Caragliu et al, 2009)
Frost & Sullivan defines as “Smart cities are an evolved state of urbanization where application of technology integrates diverse individual entities such as buildings, utilities, authorities, infrastructure and industries.”
In short, a smart city is one that uses information technology to solve urban problems
An urban center that is workable and sustainable over a long period is what defines a true “Smart City”
Simplifying Smart City: A Smart City effectively delivers public and civil services to citizens and businesses in an integrated and resource efficient way while enabling innovative collaborations to improve quality of life and grow the local and national economy focusing on three key factors.
Smart Cities Can Be Identified along Six primary Axes
Benchmarks of Smart City
Smart City Initiatives
Select initiatives would be the backbone and other initiatives would follow as value additions
Glance of Smart City
Smart Bandra Kurla Complex
Smart BKC would be showcased as the first Brownfield Smart City in India and Globally benchmarked Intelligent International Finance Centre’
An overview of Smart BKC
MMRDA envisioned BKC to be an easily accessible, intelligent and sustainable International Financial & Business Hub
• BKC was instituted by MMRDA to create an easily accessible, intelligent and sustainable International Financial and Business hub.
• BKC houses a number of financial & business houses including National Stock Exchange, SEBI, ICICI Bank, Citibank, Dena Bank, Bank of Baroda, State Bank of India , Jammu & Kashmir Bank National Business Centre, NABARD Head Office, IL&FS, Asian Heart Institute, Dow Chemicals, Bharat Diamond Bourse, Dhirubhai Ambani International School, American School of Bombay & Fortune 500.
• It also is home to the Mumbai Cricket Association's cricket ground and the United States Mumbai Consulate.
• Open plots in the BKC area are given out on rent to host events and are known as the MMRDA grounds.
• There are 6,40,000 employees working in the BKC area
• About 64000 people is assumed to be the floating population that comes to BKC everyday
• Apart from this about 1,560,0,000 people visit the MMRDA exhibition grounds every year
• Total available office area E & G – 6400000 sqm
• Total length of roads in E &G – 20km
A smart city Journey for Bandra Kurla Complex is defined to help achieve this vision
For BKC the approach is guided by citizen, businesses, economic and environmental needs to select, shortlist and design the Initiatives
5 initiatives - Making BKC as a Smart City
The vision for an Smart BKC MMRDA envisages implementation of all five initiatives as part of phase 1 – this will improve the quality of life for stakeholders of BKC
Smart Cities- Smart BKC
