Cities technological infrastructure

Technology is nowadays a preminent component inside people life, composing a wide material and immaterial infrastructure inside cities. However, not only digital technologies are present, as the term infrastructure refers to a wider range of component and elements. In fact, infrastructure is, with buildings, a necessary component of cities, in order to answer to liveability needs. As defined by several authors, their design has been present sinche the Roman Empire and it answered to a holistic view of the city, to a precise image (Gilles, 1985; Losasso, 2016). As highlighted by Bertrand Gilles inside Technical History (and re-cited by Losasso in Techne vol 11, 2016), technical systems have always been associated with economical and social dimension, giving a precise answer to current constraints. Today, the economic growth gives an implified dimension of infrastructures, which is, sometimes, less manageable and under control maybe due to the absence of precise drawings and urban visions (Losasso, 2016). In addition, the redefinition of infrastructure’s role is leading to its interdependency and to a new immaterial dimension, mantaining, in the same time, a predominant role in making cities usable and functionable (Losasso, 2016). Nevertheless, this important driving force of change is not a unicum into the history of humanity.

In fact, it is possible to observe important similarities inside history: for example, those caused by the Industrial Revolution, by the electricity invention, by the use of concrete into the constructions sector, by the engine and cars’ age. Therefore, often, such innovations were triggered by states of crisis, resource shortages or environment/hygienic problems (Hajer & Dassen, 2014). As in the past, at present, the diffusion of innovative technologies inside all levels of people life is seen as a similar revolution as it has influenced in a relevant way urban contexts both on physical and social space (Cairncross, 1997; Claudel & Ratti, 2016; Hajer &

Dassen, 2014; Mitchell, 2000; Smith, 2001). When speaking about SC, generally, the technology intended is the Internet-based technology and the ICT sector.

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In fact, it is reasonable to affirm that the inclusion of such technologies inside people life is growing day by day and it is putting the discussion about integration of systems at the centre of an important part of the debate (Claudel & Ratti, 2016;

Mele, 2016; Smith, 2001). But speaking about innovative technologies, applied to cities, doesn’t only mean considering ICT, but a wider range of other devices and instruments. In fact, cities are shaped with a very complex and interrelated technological architecture (Losasso, 2016), defined by several networks, such as energy, water, waste, mobility, ICT: as the hydropolis, electropolis, informational and cyber city described by (Graham, 2000). As evidenced by Graham, all those cities are strictly interconnected and very rarely one infrastructure is developed alone or modifications inside one part don’t influence the other.

Innovative technologies enter inside this network which is multi-layered and complex, with the aim of optimisation, efficiency and increased sustainability and it is reasonable to evidence how new technologies aim to enhance the dynamic configuration of these systems, following several trends, as evidenced by (Claudel

& Ratti, 2016). Some of these trends can be highlighted as following:

i) Participation 2.0: involvement of citizens inside decision-making. Different enablers are available: not only cities’ platform, which can be well conceived and can become real services (as in the case of Amsterdam), but also apps allowing citizens to participate into the real life of their neighbourhood (e.g. apps allowing to report on space problems, etc.).

ii) Data collection. The trend about collecting data is maybe one of the most pursued one, actually. Data are considered of high value for addressing any sort of strategies on urban systems. They can cover different themes:

building behaviour, indoor and outdoor performances, people behaviour, energy management, mobility, etc. Innovative examples of data collection are systems based on crowd-monitoring, where smartphones are playing a central role into revealing the position of people inside a space.

iii) Automation and responsive objects. A big part of technology developers are addressed in producing various objects able to directly act in dependence of a specific input. The Passenger city can be a specific example. (Claudel & Ratti, 2016) calls Passenger City the trend seeing cars become self-driving: instead of being parked 23 hours per day, each car can self-drive with optimised trajectories for example for different component of a family. Also Climate control systems whit intelligent thermostats are examples of the same trend. Instead of having homes heated or cooled when people are not inside, intelligent thermostats can

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switch on and off the system only when necessary.

iv) Redefinition of common and public spaces uses. The trend of re-define education systems and works is going toward the delocalization of activities inside homes, leaving public space for other uses.

v) Increasing of personal/small economies, makers, personalisation of objects, services and innovative cultural and artistic production is gaining a new age through the use of the digital world. Mass production is giving the way to original and personalized products.

All these evidenced trends seems to have a backbone in solving specific challenges (Santamouris, 2016), which can be described as following:

i) to increase the global energy efficiency and sustainability of the urban system;

ii) to increase the global resilience of the urban system;

iii) to enable consumers through digital;

iv) to optimise the management of the system, e.g. by detecting losses (water, electricity), by connecting networks, by making more effective transports, etc.

If cities’ infrastructure is schematized as in fig.1.11, it is possible to visualize how innovative technologies interact with the actual urban system (fig.1.12).

Please note that both picture are schematization of the concept.

The circular system coming out from optimization and collection of data is one of the main objective of such strategies and technologies application (M.

Batty, 2013; Michael Batty, 2008).

Therefore actual technologies can also be described evidencing their role as passive or active enablers. In fact, current devices and strategies can be divided into active enablers, when technology is physically added, as an object (sensors, systems, etc.) or in passive enablers, when the technology is not a physical object but a strategy able to activate passive benefits (e.g. more green surfaces produce more evapotranspiration which produce benefits to the resilience of the system).

Table 1.4 resumes some of the main trends of innovative technologies found in major cases study. The table is the result of the case study analysis conducted in the present research, which extends the studies conducted by (Neirotti, De Marco, Cagliano, Mangano, & Scorrano, 2014).

As a conclusion, technology is currently considered as a major part of SC development, both when speaking about digital / ICTs technologies and building or passive technologies. It seems clear that planning a SC need a complex and

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multi-layer approach in order to meet some of the challenges that future cities are facing. As defined by (Graham, 2000), technological components are part of the urban system and contribute to the collaboration among different systems and innovative devices need to be framed in order to enhance these interrelations but also to enable citizens and consumers to be part of the economic circle.

Theme General description

Energy

Smart Grid

Electric network able to take in consideration the energetic request of all connected users, on a real time perspective. It is also able to manage peaks of demand.

Lighting

Lighting systems able to have different functions at the same time: lighting (often LED), air quality control and monitoring, Wi-Fi hotspots, traffic mana-gement systems. Real time systems. Multi sensorial integration: architectu-ral, sound and lighting.

Green and re-newables

Renewable systems able also to monitor consumption and give real time information.

Mobility Transport Meaning of transport (e-bike, e-vehicles). Intermodal systems.

Logistic Innovative transport network and systems. Management instruments of loads and roads.

Info - mobility Users information and monitoring

Resources

Water Water management systems on the ICT level, physical transformation level (e.g. streets quotes), water collection basins, vegetation implementation.

Air Air monitoring and management with ICT systems, but also with vegetation implementation targeted to CO2 emissions reduction.

Waste

Urban waste management through monitoring and real time data collection, recycling systems, re-use of organic waste for green energy production or for urban agriculture.

Urban Agriculture Urban gardens and agriculture, greening and vegetation able to effect mitiga-tion and to produce food. Sensors implementamitiga-tion.

Economy

Sharing Economy Instruments and services for the development of shared economies (ICT systems for food transport and sharing). Sharing experiences.

Cultural economy Augmented reality, digital technologies and apps for an enhanced culture use.

Society Safety

Citizen’s protection through citizens active involvement, also with the pre-sence of ICT systems and alert systems. Open space design as a prevention system (lighting and flux management, usages on time, etc.).

Participation Citizens’ involvement through participative processes, through education methodologies (interactive and analogic). Information share.

Table 1. 4 Summary of some most used technologies (ICT or not) divided in themes, as proposed in (Neirotti, De Marco, Cagliano, Mangano, & Scorrano, 2014). The original list have been completed with

personal observations

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Deepening on ICT sector: a brief analysis

Digital technologies and ICTs are the currently most used technologies for making cities smarter (M. Batty, 2013;

Michael Batty, 2008; Kitchin, 2014; Vallianatos, 2015). But inside this sector lot of application and devices can be ev-idenced. In this box are evidenced some of this application. This box provide a brief inside on some ICT tecnologies.

Different trends acting into the contemporary city and mainly related to the evolution of digital infrastructures and to the sustainable evolution, can be identified: web-based technologies; data gathering and computing; soft-ware-based tools for planning; digital-based objects / products. In fact, some of the most common devices applied in cities can be summarized as following:

- models and interoperable systems or platforms (e.g. data platforms in which it is possible to find information on climate, on services, etc., but also the systems and models based on a software that make easier the urban man-agement and planning);

- sensors and capturing systems, storage platforms (e.g. sensors for pollutant emissions and energy consumption);

- networks or displays allowing the sharing of information and data (e.g. e-government platforms);

- automation systems (e.g. systems allowing the use of automatic functions3);

- different kinds of apps and end-users services (e.g. apps for parking or pay as your throw systems for waste man-agement, etc.);

- physical infrastructure allowing the digital soft-structure function (optic fiber, wifi repeaters, etc.).

Nevertheless, digital technologies are made possible by some improvement and innovations (AA.VV., 2013; ISO/IEC JTC 1, 2014) inside the sector in itself:

- ubiquitous computing, a specific software engineering in contrast with desktop computing, allowing the presence of computing everywhere. This allows an interaction with digital services through different forms and objects.

- networking technologies which make devices, computers and people able to interact through communication paths.

- open data, that means making available sets of data (generally administrative, research, or governmental) to the public for visualisation, use and re-use.

- big data, which are defined as “any collection of data sets so large, complex and rapidly changing that it becomes difficult to process using traditional database management tools or traditional data processing applications” (ISO/

IEC JTC 1, 2014, p. 17).

- GIS (Geographic Information System), that is the possibility to provide location based services.

- Cloud computing, that is the use of internet based products (computing) as services instead of as products. As an example, the archiving services on internet: the archive is used as a utility to users, that are not configured for one specific user but are available (and used) in a rapid and fluid way to a group of users.

- SOA (Service-Oriented Architecture), which is a software architecture (or frame) able to support the use of Web services in order to guarantee the interoperability among different systems. This allows the use of single applica-tions as components of a overriding system.

- E-government, it is the possibility for administrations and governments to interact with citizens and other stake-holder on a digital based platform.

- Embedded networks into the urban context; they are systems and services integrate into the space. For instance sensors and devices giving a real-time computing capacities and end-users displays.

- IoT (Internet of Things), that is literally the possibility to all objects of being connecting through Internet. It is expected that this system will allow important evolutions into the life-style of into the urban management. As a simple example, an alarm clock can ring before or later in correlation to traffic congestions data.

Gaps to be fulfilled

Those technologies aim to fulfill the technological needs for smart urban development. As set by the ISO and IEC associations, the smart city has several technological needs, summarized as following:

- to develop coherent models for system interoperability;

- to share the use and compatibility of different systems;

- to make data exchange fluid and rapid;

- to facilitate the use of aggregated data and improve the querying;

- to ensure that the data are used in a safe and secure way (also sensible data);

- to allow a greater automation.

Economic potentialities

The technological sector on ICT is reaching important market development’s targets, even if the International En-ergy Agency declares that 65% of the economic potential of enEn-ergy efficient technologies are still untapped (San-tamouris, 2016; Van der Hoeven, 2011). Actually, it is expected an increase to 1365 billion of euros by 2050 of energy efficient products total volume (in 2013 the amount was 825 billions) (BMUB, 2014; Santamouris, 2016).

Table 1. 5 Deepening on ICT sector: a brief analysis

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1.3 Smart City instruments: strategies toward 2050 and policies