Suitable Approaches for Smart Cities and Our Life

讲座题目：Suitable Approaches for Smart Cities and Our Life

主讲人：Vijay Vohora博士（英国Mapping Earth Resources Ltd公司，高级咨询师）

时间：5月21日（周一）9:00-11：00，

地点：X4520

内容简介：

Our Earth is a beautiful place to live in. However, at present all countries are worried about how long we could save the Earth’s beauty and protect our environment. In the last few decades, rapid growth in population has created a multiple complex problem which needs serious attention.

No doubt, we can understand very well that nowadays more people are living in cities, for their career development opportunities and businesses. According to UN prediction, by 2030 urban areas are projected to house 5 billion people globally, that is, 60% of total population. It is also estimated that by 2050, some 70% of world’s population will be living in cities. This growth indeed presents new and growing challenges to the way we live our lives.

It is also true that there will be a huge growth in the availability of data sources as our cities grows with population. Data sets about how people live, travel, work, communicate; how cities function and our infrastructure copes to meet the demands of the future. Government authorities and business bodies of almost all countries have chosen a special term called ‘Smart Cities’, and these countries are looking for appropriate solutions for forthcoming complex problems.

In fact, there is no one definition for ‘smart city’. Many city leaders and especially the private sector think that this term has become a shorthand for technology that makes cities work better or more efficiently. In other words, we can consider that a Smart City is a municipality that uses information and communication technologies to increase operational efficiency, share information with the public and improve both the quality of government services and citizen welfare.

In last decade, few cities followed the path to become smart cities. In this talk, these cities will be cited as examples to understand the achievements and failures, so that precautionary measure for the future development of smart cities could be considered carefully. The talk will also include some thoughtful ideas to design appropriate strategies for developing sustainable smart cities. The ideas are about:

• Waste management.
• Conversion of waste to wealth.
• Housing for growing population and issue of deforestation.
• Growing cities - the concrete jungle triggering air pollution.
• Negative impact on our health caused by rising city temperature.
• Suitable safe and fast transportation services for commuting.
• Appropriate emergency services – hospitals, accidents, utility, crime, etc.
• Automation and Job creation for growing population.
• New education system to fit best to adopt changes.
• Would Internet of Things (IOT) be expensive or will save our environment.

To solve the complex problems of smart cities, we will definitely need well-trained professionals, sooner or later. Therefore, many world-renowned Universities are currently preparing to design special Master level courses for Urban City Informatics. The qualified trained experts will achieve skills to solve smart cities problems. They will use hi-tech technologies in fast-track communicating mode with public, government authorities and businesses to decide suitable real-time solutions for smart cities.

欢迎大家前往！

地学学院

2018年5月

Vijay Vohora

X4520