Global Resources and Promising Practices for Building and Refining Accessible and Inclusive Smart Cities from Darren Bates LLC.
When urban planners envision their work for the 21st century, many often say it’ll begin with fixing the shortcomings put in place in the 20th century. However, the question remains whether professionals can make those changes quickly enough to avoid the worst consequences of their mistakes. Here are four urban planning fails that should be near the top of the list as professionals assess what to address first.
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South Korea’s second largest city is using new, inclusive technology to bring down barriers to mobility for people who are blind.
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Seniors have the most to gain from pedestrian and cycling improvements—yet they often feel threatened by changes that provide alternatives to driving. Here are ways to include seniors in active transportation planning. The first time someone accused me of being “ableist” I was shocked. I was advocating ways to make downtown more walkable, including pedestrianizing some streets. I view walkability…
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One of the principles we lift up in our report is to “build with, not for” affected communities. For technology to deliver on the promise of increased inclusion, design and implementation need to be grounded in the needs and priorities of communities. To do this equitably requires actively engaging and listening to residents throughout the process.
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Urban Air Mobility must incorporate the needs of disabled citizens if the promise – and full market value – of advanced air mobility and urban air mobility systems are to be fully realized.
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Citizen participation throughout the urban planning process can lead to the development of spaces and buildings that enable cities to develop urban environments that truly reflect people’s needs and preferences.
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Hannes J. Lagrelius, WBU Programme Officer for Accessibility in Smart Cities Initiative sums up key highlights of the UN Habitat Assembly with reference to persons with disabilities. The Assembly was held on 27-31 May 2019, at the headquarters of UN-Habitat in Nairobi, Kenya.
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When the Amazon Kindle was released, their ebooks didn’t work with commonly used screen readers, making accessibility difficult for the blind community. The National Federation of the Blind (NFB) in the United States campaigned to change this for years, in vain. Then Amazon won a $30 million USD contract with the New York City Department of Education in 2015 to…
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Around 68% of the global population might live in urban areas by 2050. Smart cities will likely be a part of this future, promising to make our lives more convenient, more secure and more sustainable. Mostly, the stakeholders of smart city projects are politicians, consultants, academics and tech companies. However, the most important group of stakeholders is often missing: the…
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To ensure #SmartCities are correctly constructed for the elderly, it is necessary to include them in the planning phase. Young people cannot understand the issues faced by the elderly. such as climbing up the stairs or walking on an uneven sidewalk.
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How co-creation is shaping the future of cities As the famous urban activist Jane Jacobs once wrote, “Cities have the capability of providing something for everybody, only because, and only when, they are created by everybody.” It’s a truth that lies at the heart of a number of urban co-creation projects, which tap into the collective knowledge of citizens to…
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Public authorities, transport operators, civil society organisations and other public and private sector stakeholder in Greater Lyon have been successfully improving accessibility addressing it as a cross-cutting issue and investing substantially in creating a barrier-free and inclusive environment.
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How to foster dynamic civic participation, ignite citizen co-creation, and leverage human-centered urban design Lessons learned in the 20-year history of Smart Cities are testaments to the truth that successful and sustainable Smart Cities cannot be built solely upon the technology mainframe. Instead, cities must support and engage the broader community, prioritize and practice human-centered urban design, and provide diverse, accessible,…
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New mobility services have enormous potential to change the transportation landscape and increase access for all residents. But, only a few projects are actually focused on that. As new mobility models continue to have an impact on our transportation system and shift how our cities are designed and operate, cities and transit agencies are launching new pilot projects to test…
Read More As part of a #SmartCity #PeopleFirst approach, it’s incumbent upon everyone to acknowledge our collective responsibility as fellow human beings to remove access barriers preventing persons who are aging, #disabled and other underserved populations from equitable civic engagement. pic.twitter.com/vhweMbkyhi — Smart Cities Library™ (@SmartCitiesL) July 10, 2018
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Sidewalk-Toronto is excited to announce their public engagement plan, outlining a series of events, activities, and opportunities designed to get citizens involved in the co-creation of their Smart City. Check it out: http://bit.ly/2BPhy8T
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Understanding the needs of the population helps to design effective urban projects and create better cities and public spaces. Photo by Mariana Gil / WRI Brasil Cidades Sustentáveis / Flickr Our impressions of a city are formed mainly by the quality of public spaces. If they are not pleasant and preserved, or if they transmit a sense of insecurity, we…
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The top-10 was rounded out by Montreal (6th), Boston (7th), Melbourne (8th), Barcelona (9th) and Shanghai (10th). A total of 140 cities of all sizes from around the world were evaluated based on existing smart city rankings, news articles and online resources to measure their commitment to building a smart city. Each city was then given a score of one…
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Smart cities are getting more and more attention in the media, from technology companies and entrepreneurs, and increasingly from both local governments and civil society. On one hand, smart cities hold the promise to potentially make the growing number of cities around the globe more efficient, more tech-savvy, more wired–and with all that, they can hopefully improve the quality of…
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In a time of urban transformation and digitalisation of smart cities, too little attention is sometime given to citizens. Citizen Focus Action Cluster strongly believes in citizens as fundamental actors for the regeneration and development of smart cities. Civic engagement, empowerment, participation and co-creation are at the basis of our advocacy approach since we acknowledge that citizen voice can be…
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