Llibert Serra, head gardener of the Parc del Centre de Poblenou in Barcelona, uses an iPad mini to demonstrate “smart” watering. Image Source: nytimes.com
BARCELONA, Spain — The streets here offer a glimpse of what the future may have to offer.
Alongside the city’s world-famous architecture and pristine sandy beaches, sensors attached to trash cans now alert workers when they need to be emptied.
The irrigation systems built into Barcelona’s parks monitor soil moisture and turn on sprinklers when water is needed. And drivers can use a smartphone application to find the nearest available parking spot in the labyrinthine streets.
“It’s crucial that these new technologies are useful to our citizens,” Xavier Trias, Barcelona’s mayor, said in his stately offices, which date from the 15th century. “It’s an important change. We have to create a sustainable system.”
Barcelona is among a number of European cities adopting new forms of technology aimed at improving services. More important, the investments, including neighborhoodwide high-speed Internet connections and electricity charge points for cars and motorbikes, offer ways to cut energy use and generate income.
READY FOR PICKUP A “smart” waste collection system saves space and sends a signal when containers are full.
Image Source: nytimes.com
The push mirrors efforts in cities including San Francisco and Boston, which have spent millions of dollars to upgrade their infrastructure. Other projects have appeared elsewhere, notably Masdar City, a planned high-tech habitat created from scratch in Abu Dhabi.
Yet analysts say Europe, despite being hard hit by the recent financial crisis — and in part because of it — remains a step ahead of the United States in creating efficient, so-called smart cities that combine traditional services like electricity networks with 21st-century technology like Internet-connected home appliances.
“Europe has embraced the concept more than the U.S.,” said Bas Boorsma, a director at Cisco Systems who helps cities upgrade their infrastructure. “It will always require partnerships between the private sector and government, and Europe does that better.”
Given Europe’s economic doldrums (which bring the mixed blessing of less industrial pollution), many of the Continent’s governments have shifted from an emphasis on big renewable energy projects to saving money, while enlisting the private sector and exploiting the growing business possibilities of smartphones and tablets.
Mayors in places including Copenhagen and Hamburg hope to cut their cities’ energy and water use and waste by upgrading municipal services so they can monitor how services are delivered and pinpoint where savings can be found.
In Barcelona, where the unemployment rate remains above 20 percent, the city expects to cut its water bill by 25 percent this year after installing sensors in local parks. The annual savings are expected to total almost $60 million.
“We were wasting a lot of water,” said Julia Lopez, coordinator of Barcelona’s smart city program. “We can now control the system directly from an iPad.”
The infrastructure upgrades have led to agreements between cities and some of the world’s largest technology companies, including IBM, Hewlett-Packard and General Electric. By deploying their technology in citywide pilot projects, these companies say they can test new business models and other services that might have worldwide appeal.
In January, Google reached a $3.2 billion deal to buy Nest Labs, which makes energy-saving devices like Internet-connected thermostats and smoke detectors. Nest says its products, designed by former Apple engineers, can cut household heating and cooling bills by around 20 percent by monitoring people’s habits and adjusting the thermostat automatically.
Growing corporate interest is inspiring new alliances across the Atlantic.
The European technology companies Philips and Ericsson, for example, are working with Verizon Wireless on a pilot project in the United States that will combine energy-efficient street lighting with mobile phone infrastructure. This year, Philips and Ericsson plan to start selling their new product to city governments. The idea is to provide cities a source of income through rentals of streetlights to carriers that want to expand their cellphone coverage. The companies also expect that the energy-efficient streetlights will offer savings of about 50 percent compared with traditional lighting.
“We’re trying to solve the problem of how to make cities more sustainable,” said Hans Vestberg, Ericsson’s chief executive. “These projects are key for cities that want to remain globally competitive.”
While cutting electricity use and garbage collections has environmental benefits, policy makers say that economic returns, not carbon dioxide reductions, are now driving many cities’ plans.
Two years ago, for example, Amsterdam’s planners changed how they funded technology projects intended to improve city services.
Amsterdam had previously subsidized upgrades in the local electricity network and other infrastructure but had seen little improvement in city finances. In response, its policy makers started investing in local start-ups that were creating businesses using advanced technical infrastructure, through a 70 million euro, or $96 million, fund.
They also fostered partnerships among local businesses to take advantage of previous investments. Among them were Ajax, a soccer team, which paid a nearby hospital to generate electricity for its home matches by installing solar panels on the hospital roof.
“The financial crisis helped us to think differently,” said Ger Baron, Amsterdam’s chief technology officer. “We don’t subsidize anymore. We invest.”
Across Europe, cities are opening their infrastructure to companies eager to offer new services that provide revenue for the city and offer potential environmental benefits.
In London, the start-up Citymapper used access to the city’s transport data to create a smartphone application that helps people navigate the complicated bus and subway networks. Azmat Yusuf, the company’s founder, said that since Citymapper started in 2011, usage of London’s iconic red buses jumped significantly, creating additional revenue for local government and cutting the number of cars on the streets. The app is now available in New York, Berlin and Paris. And last year in Barcelona, Jaume Mayor, a local entrepreneur, created WeSmartPark, a service aimed at making it easier for drivers to find parking spaces.
Mr. Mayor said drivers spent up to 20 percent of their time looking for places to park, even as many spaces across the city remained empty during the day when residents were at work.
With his 10-person team, Mr. Mayor created a system to allow individuals to rent out their private parking spaces by installing sensors that record when they are available. The information is transmitted in real time over local mobile networks, and customers can book the spaces hourly through a smartphone app.
So far, Mr. Mayor has signed up 1,500 parking spaces across the city, including some at shopping malls and hospitals. He also has almost 100,000 users, or roughly 6 percent of Barcelona’s total population.
“We’re using the resources that we already have, but getting more use out of them,” Mr. Mayor said. “Because people are driving less to find parking spaces, Barcelona as a city is getting a direct benefit.”
Pete Kampfer worked as an economic development executive in a tourist destination community before serving as a city manager of Raton, N.M.,where he gained recognition for his contribution for the region’s economic and urban planning development. Follow this Twitter page for more links to insightful discussions on urban design, city management, and economic planning.
