Title: Participatory governance in smart cities: the urbanAPI case study

Authors: Kamran Soomro; Zaheer Khan; David Ludlow

Addresses: Department of Computer Science and Creative Technologies, Faculty of Environment and Technology, Centre for Complex Cooperative Systems, University of the West of England (UWE), Bristol, UK ' Department of Computer Science and Creative Technologies, Faculty of Environment and Technology, Centre for Complex Cooperative Systems, University of the West of England (UWE), Bristol, UK ' Department of Architecture and the Built Environment, Faculty of Environment and Technology, Centre for Sustainable Planning and Environments, University of the West of England (UWE), Bristol, UK

Abstract: This paper presents some results from an EU FP7 RTD project urbanAPI, in which three ICT applications target different aspects of participatory urban governance. The 3D Scenario Creator allows urban planners to visualise urban development proposals in three dimensions, share them with different stakeholders and obtain their feedback. The Mobility Explorer allows urban land use and transport planners to visualise and analyse population distribution and mobility patterns in the city. Finally, the Urban Development Simulator simulates socio-economic activity in response to alternative planning scenarios. These urbanAPI ICT applications are implemented in four pilot cities; Vienna (Austria), Vitoria-Gasteiz (Spain), Bologna (Italy) and Ruse (Bulgaria), and evaluated with respect to their various requirements. Results show that the applications are useful tools, enhancing spatial planning assessements, and enabling public participation, communicating proposed plans to different stakeholders and identifying key development issues which can provide crucial inputs in planning and decision making processes.

Keywords: smart cities; participatory governance; co-production.

DOI: 10.1504/IJSTM.2017.088945

International Journal of Services Technology and Management, 2017 Vol.23 No.5/6, pp.419 - 444

Received: 05 Dec 2015
Accepted: 10 Aug 2016
Published online: 03 Jan 2018 *

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