Propelling the Middle East into the forefront of smart city development, MEED Smart Cities Summit, 9 September 2014
Introduction
It is a real pleasure to be here to talk about smart cities from a planning, design and engineering perspective.
Gazing into the future, and trying to understand how our lives and lifestyles will change, is as important as it is fascinating.
It is something we have to do with real conviction to ensure what we are designing now – the buildings, public realm and all the supporting infrastructure – is going to be fit for purpose in the long term.
It is arguably even more important that we get this ‘future proofing’ right here in the Middle East, in the Gulf states, because of the sheer volume of new infrastructure development, and because of the naturally high level of
urbanisation.
There is also something more personal here for me, as a business leader, that I play my small part in making sure we contribute to a better future. It’s the type of challenge that drives engineers, architects and planners – it’s why most of us joined our profession.
SLIDE 2: Statistics
The statistics regarding urbanisation are very well documented:
- In 2010 the human population crossed a new line, with more than 50 per cent of people living in cities.
- The predictions are that by 2050 that figure will rise to 75 per cent. Here in the GCC, 88 per cent of people are forecast to be urbanised by 2025. That’s quite a head start on the rest of the world, and a fantastic challenge to respond to for our industry!
So there should be no questioning – we can’t afford to leave our rapidly developing cities in this region to be locked into a legacy of unsuitable and unsustainable infrastructure. Nor can we miss the opportunity to create incredible places which allow strong, integrated communities to flourish.
And this is exciting, because mankind is at its most inventive and innovative when need is at its greatest.
What’s more, theory – and the weight of history – suggests that dense urban communities, such as we have here, foster greater innovation and invention because of the way they bring creative minds together.
SLIDE 3: Pressure points
So where are we going to see the pressure of urban population growth exert itself? ...on the region’s transport networks, energy and water supplies and critical resources such as food – these are the building blocks of our urban environments, and they’re critical to supporting strong social cohesion.
What this adds up to is that we here in this region really need to make our cities ‘smart’. By which I mean we need to harness technology to help us make better use of the resources available to us. This, to me, is the definition of a smart city.
It is the ultimate collaboration of urban design and technology to create liveable and inclusive cities, which are more resilient, more enjoyable, more desirable places for people to live, work and play. And if we get it right, it’s a virtuous circle which will breed economic success and long term prosperity for this region.
So I believe that despite the fact that every leading nation and city on the planet is talking about smart cities, the Middle East has a very special opportunity to lead the way.
And let us not forget that this region also has the capital to make it happen, the ability to take risks, and the vision of leaders to believe.
SLIDE 4: Building a legacy
It might be compared to the opportunities which were grasped by Great Britain at the outset of the Industrial Revolution.
The Victorians embraced technology and applied it to their manufacturing. They invested heavily in their urban
infrastructure – London Underground, the railways, utilities, the sewerage network. Everything worked together to give them a competitive advantage which the UK was able to benefit from, and export to others, for 150 years.
You’ll note that in my slide here, these photos of Victorian infrastructure aren’t from old archives – this is working infrastructure which is still in use today!
There are some significant similarities and lessons from this which the GCC cities and states can draw upon.
Consider the UAE, with its dynamic, can-do approach. It is a young and growing nation which is quick to embrace technology. Just look, in very simple terms, at mobile phone ownership, which is at more than two per person and among the highest rates per capita in the world.
This country is an early adopter which isn’t afraid to take carefully considered risks, and fundamentally, there is strong, visionary leadership. So I think the scene is set – we’ve got the world at our feet!
To create successful cities, we need to create and maintain urban environments that people are attracted to.
SLIDE 5: London 2012
There’s an interesting question here... Is a city smart when it has a wow factor, or is a city smart when you don’t have to think about it? I like the idea of an effortless interaction with infrastructure and services; where you can focus on work and leisure without being distracted by disparate systems.
This takes a conscious effort to integrate design, services and information systems, and it doesn’t happen by chance. When we worked on the London 2012 Olympics there were some of my engineers who were disappointed by the lack of media coverage of the buildings and infrastructure. However, the fact that the media concentrated on the sport was because we got the infrastructure and services just right.
Take, for example, our approach to accessibility. We reviewed accessibility needs from the point of entering the country to taking a place as a spectator at a sporting event. This required an integrated approach to design, services and information across a number of stakeholders. And if we get it right, no one notices because they don’t have to think about it – it’s a sign that we’ve achieved genuinely people centric design.
Another important characteristic of successful cities is that they work on both economic and social levels; they create wealth and support strong communities, and they do it for the long term.
SLIDE 6: Sasaki findings...
So how do you give people a positive urban experience?
A survey which was published this summer by fellow design consultancy Sasaki Associates questioned people in six US cities about their urban experience. They found that the biggest complaint of city dwellers was about levels of traffic. I’m sure that sounds familiar to all of us in this region, and as our cities get busier the problem is going to keep getting worse.
The only way we can really solve it, whether in the US, the Middle East or anywhere else in the world, is by breaking people of their car habit. And that was Sasaki’s conclusion as well.
SLIDE 7: Offering transport choices
In fact, some of the most successful cities to wean people away from cars are also the most densely populated, such as New York, London, Copenhagen, Hong Kong and Singapore. Their public transport systems are so successful that they’re having to find ways to improve capacity or even-out the peaks.
For instance, in Singapore the Local Transport Authority has started to offer free travel to metro commuters who reach their destination before 7.45am. This is a great example of how leading cities need to be constantly taking on new ideas.
The work being done to develop major metro networks across the GCC is an important step in giving people new choices.
But encouraging alternative methods of transport is about more than installing metro systems, transformational though this is. The fabric of our cities here still overwhelmingly prioritises cars, while walking, cycling and public transport are often seen as fallback options for those with no other choice.
Cars themselves are set to fundamentally change with the move to driverless technology.
However, the move to driverless technology for cars doesn’t change our essential need to enable a social and cultural shift in transportation needs and expectations – getting us out of our cars!
I believe that the combined forces of great urban infrastructure design and technology investment present our strongest opportunity to give people the choice and freedom to make use of multiple modes of transport.
Technology, of course, changes at an incredible rate and benefits from a flexibility which our built environment could never expect to emulate.
One way in which technology is currently enabling change is being developed in Helsinki, Finland, which has announced plans to transform its existing public transport network into a point-to-point, mobility on-demand system within the next ten years.
City-wide, this would intelligently link together taxis, shared cars, ferries, trains, shared bikes, driverless cars, buses and trams through a single app.
In theory, it could render car ownership largely unnecessary in Helsinki.
It would allow residents to get around by paying by the kilometre, or by purchasing a monthly package with kilometres included, in a model similar to that used by the mobile telecommunications industry.
SLIDE 8: Harnessing technology
It’s not hard to imagine how that could work here in Dubai and other cities across the region, making use of taxis, the metro, buses, water taxis, trams... In fact, many of you have probably already used Uber, an app which enables you to book a private car direct from your mobile phone. It’s been a huge success, and shows just how quick people can be to embrace convenient user-friendly technology.
In June, the RTA launched its own smart app for taxis. To me, what this demonstrates is a public sector which is so switched on that it is ready to embrace new ways of doing things, and to learn from private sector ingenuity. It is exceptionally positive.
So we can see in these simple examples how quickly technology can create new services and opportunities to improve the liveability of our cities.
The challenge for companies like Atkins, and ultimately for our clients, is to ensure that our urban environments are enabling and integrating new behaviours, systems and technologies.
Our work in Qatar, we are working with multiple stakeholders to integrate the design and construction of transport infrastructure. We are utilising GIS technology and our practical experience to bring successfully together the state’s many transport projects and programmes so they work in a seamless, user friendly way.
It is a model we believe can be used the world over, but there is no better environment than this region for bringing together multiple stakeholders to define workable solutions against tight timescales.
In the transport related examples I have just used, we need to ensure our communities, the public realm and our transportation systems are designed in such a way that people have genuine options of how to get from A to B in comfort and ease.
But this alone won’t necessarily deliver all we need to create truly world-leading environments. SLIDE 9: Good urban design
Really good urban design also has tremendous influence to encourage positive social behaviours, and it is something which this region has really woken up to in the past few years.
In fact it is one of the most satisfying aspects of working in the built environment sector here, because there is so much to be optimistic about in the maturity of client expectations.
In our experience, visionary clients now expect designs which encourage active integration and participation in the community. The public realm should support healthier lifestyles by integrating social infrastructure, culture, leisure and hospitality and by making our public spaces more accessible, more enjoyable and more inclusive.
I want to give an example of this, because I believe it is an important stepping stone to the creation of smart Gulf cities.
SLIDE 10: Prince Sultan Cultural Center
Outside Jeddah, Atkins is working on a groundbreaking scheme called Prince Sultan Cultural Centre. The masterplan for this development aims to engender ‘social wellness’, through which residents will take ‘an active part in improving the world by encouraging a healthy living environment and initiating better communications with those around them’. The project, which is led by the Prince Sultan Cultural Centre Company, incorporates all the components needed for a strong community.
The idea behind the project is to create a new type of community for the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia which encourages ownership and involvement from everyone in order to promote physical and mental wellbeing.
Every element within the masterplan has to meet this wellness criteria in order to create a city within the city of Jeddah – a fully self-sustaining mixed-use development. For instance, from any part of the development, you will never be more than five minutes walk from a public open space.
A key component of the site area is public realm, comprising gardens, urban squares and shaded walkways, all interconnected by a large central park.
Projects like this are important, because they’re about changing mindsets and showing what is possible. The wider transport infrastructure isn’t there yet in Jeddah for us to be able to talk about linking up Prince Sultan Cultural Centre with the wider community, but this will happen.
SLIDE 11: Abu Dhabi walking and cycling masterplan
It is also important to understand that great design which encourages smart behaviours isn’t confined to new developments.
Our work for Abu Dhabi Municipality to help develop a new walking and cycling masterplan is a great example of how our established centres can be redesigned or retrofitted to become people friendly, liveable cities with the right balance between people, cars and other means of getting around.
The tenets of good urban infrastructure from projects such as this must remain at the heart of our smart cities, because they create the essential foundations. In my opinion, smart cities need to bring people together, rather than encouraging them to live ever more insular and independent lives.
SLIDE 12: Big data
I’m also fascinated and excited by the opportunity to really exploit the mass of information used and collected across cities – Big Data.
Many aspiring smart cities are leveraging data management innovations to provide essential public services to their citizens such as security, transportation, water and energy management. We’ve heard excellent presentations already this morning about the smart city visions and plans for Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Jeddah.
There is a huge opportunity here for the developer community - those which take the lead in adopting smart ways to use data and new technologies will reap the dividends because their communities will be in the top tier for desirability.
SLIDE 13: A global leader
The strong ambition and leadership which we’ve heard about this morning for our cities in the region is extremely encouraging.
Going back to my earlier assertion, that this region can be at the very forefront of smart city development, I want to just highlight a recent brave and impressive decision by Mr Elon Musk, the founder of the Tesla electric car company.
Mr Musk has made the staggeringly bold move to release all the patents for Tesla. That’s all their intellectual property released for free!
Why did he do this? In order to encourage more rapid development by putting Tesla at the centre of this digital ecosystem in order to connect minds and thus drive innovation to a whole new trajectory.
I wonder... do we have the opportunity right here to enable city-scale innovation hubs which will be able to lead the way with their sharing of pioneering thinking?
Could the region become a net exporter of smart city skills, opening up a new and dynamic economic sector?
I expect our own smart design capabilities within Atkins in this region to grow exponentially over the next five, 10, 20 years because of the way everything is lined up.
We will become intelligent solutions providers, integrating people, place, the environment and transport.
In closing, I have to say that I believe this region has a fabulous opportunity, and we should be in no doubt that it can lead the way and become a significant smart solutions player on the world economic stage. I think we can consider ourselves very privileged to be here, now, with the incredible opportunity to play our part in making it happen.
