Future Forward

Seyi (00:02)
Hello, hello, hello Reza, how are you?

Reza (00:04)
I'm good Seyi how are you doing?

Seyi (00:05)
I am doing great, I am doing great. It is another episode of Future Forward. And today we will be talking about the future of smarter cities, Reza.

Reza (00:16)
Yeah, this one is really inspired by the last episode that we had where we talked about Ibadan as a smaller megacity up and coming. And I thought about what makes good cities good. And so I sort of dove into this concept that I'm calling smarter cities because we've talked about smart cities before. yeah, so I'm...

Seyi (00:20)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Yep.

Reza (00:44)
I'm looking forward to digging into this one because we've had a lot of good conversations about this. But before we do, Seyi, let's welcome our listeners.

Seyi (00:51)
Yes, welcome, welcome new listeners. Thank you for joining us. And to our regular listeners, we truly appreciate that you keep coming back. And for our new listeners, Future Forward is a conversation Reza and I had been having for years, almost every Friday catching up at a coffee shop and discussing cities sustainability.

thriving communities, belonging in cities and the technology that sort of plays a part in creating that sense of what a city is. And we thought, you know what, let's invite more friends to the conversation. And here we are. Today's episode, as you've just mentioned, is the future of smarter cities. And as we typically do, Reza, you start from the historic context, talk about today and share what we think the future holds.

Reza (01:48)
Yeah. So, know, Seyi, the, you know, one of the core things that we explore and that our curiosity keeps going towards is like, how does technology make cities more sustainable and help the communities within them thrive? And we've talked about smart cities before we have, you know, pooh-poohed at some of the ideas around them, especially me. But let's sort of

Seyi (02:13)
you

Reza (02:17)
take the history, the smart city concept as we know it today started really gaining momentum in the 1990s and the early 2000s. You know, it was really the 2008 financial crisis that make it take off. And as cities were looking to recover, tech giants like IBM, Cisco, Siemens and others began marketing integrated urban technology systems to municipal governments. They promised efficiency.

data-driven governance, new economic models. know, tech was a big thing, and so this was a way of them packaging this to cities. IBM's Smarter Planet campaign in 2008 was one of the first to explicitly promote the idea of the smart city as a system of interconnected technologies, traffic sensors, predictive policing, smart grids, automated service delivery. And the logic was that the more data that you have, it's the better.

the better decisions that you can make, which will lead to better cities. And so these corporations saw this opportunity to sell technological solutions to these urban challenges like traffic congestion, energy consumption, public safety, things that we've talked about in multiple episodes. And the initial focus was predominantly on deploying sensors, networks, data analytics to optimize city operations. So very tech forward, like let's put things in to solve these problems.

By 2010, we saw the first wave of large-scale smart city projects. They were often really top-down, technology-driven approaches. Cities like Songdo in South Korea, Masdar City in the UAE. They were designed as greenfield smart cities with technology embedded from the ground up. My god, this sounds terrible as I'm saying this. It just sounds so marketing-oriented. But as this model scaled,

Seyi (04:01)
you

Reza (04:08)
The whole thing was it was prioritizing infrastructure and optimization over social outcomes, which is the place where I always find this challenging. This was really a technocratic vision and it tended to be led by these private sector innovators or corporations rather than grassroots community identified needs. So in the 2010s,

criticism grew louder, smart cities weren't necessarily smarter for people, they were just automated, were tech oriented, but not really solving problems for the people that live there. Well, let pause over there and then I'll go into sort of today and some of the examples and things.

Seyi (04:49)
Yeah, no, thanks for the framing. And it is true. If there was any point in all the historical context we've been digging into about the development of cities, if there's any point that best describes how we put the, I guess, the cart before the horse, which is the technology before the people, this smart cities idea was absolutely.

the one it was championed by corporations who I can imagine convinced cities of the possible revenues and maybe greater clarity on how to better run their cities. as far as I can tell, and as you shared there,

We saw those large scale projects, but we never saw the large scale benefits for the people. So it's, I really appreciate the framing and the context setting there. Cause yeah, we might bash smart cities on this show, but there's probably validation for that. Yeah.

Reza (05:51)
Yeah.

Yeah, yeah,

yeah. So the example that I'm going to give is the one that we've bashed before, Seyi, so we'll jump into sort of the current state. And we've talked about the Sidewalk project in Toronto. And so this is when Smart goes sideways. It's a cautionary tale. It was really this smart neighborhood project that was led by Sidewalk Labs, which was a subsidiary of Alphabet.

Seyi (06:15)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Reza (06:36)
Google, its parent company. It was launched in 2017 and it was a proposal for the Toronto's Quayside project. It promised eco-friendly buildings, dynamic streets, data-driven urban environment. But let's talk about what went wrong over there, because this is a really good example of what not to do. There was data privacy concerns, really three things. One, data privacy concerns, residents and advocacy groups, they got alarmed about

how data would be collected, stored, monetized. Like it's their data, it's them. 2019 survey found that over 60 % of folks from Toronto did not trust private companies to manage that urban data. Two, there were governance issues. Critics argued that sidewalk labs had too much control over public land and infrastructure decisions. There was a lack of democratic oversight. Why is a corporation governing this public good?

And three, was a lack of community engagement. This project was largely driven by engineers and executives, not by community voices. And this led to designs that didn't reflect local needs. And so by 2020, Sidewalk Labs withdrew in the takeaway Smart City initiatives without transparency, without trust, without that inclusive planning are going to struggle no matter how innovative the technology. And Google, very, very innovative company, but you can't overcome.

these types of challenges. What do you think Shady? We've talked about this before so...

Seyi (08:06)
Yeah, we

have, yeah. And I'll try not to repeat the comments I made the last few times we've talked about it. But as you were talking, the thing that popped in mind for me was I distinctly remember when this whole thing was going on in Toronto. I ended up at a Cities of the Future conference in San Antonio.

And one of the

main opponent of this and her name fills me now but she was one of the speakers on the panel that I was on and she was talking about the the core issue and you nailed it it was the lack of community engagement there was zero willingness to get input from the people this was going to be dropped on them

Reza (08:48)
Interesting.

Mmm.

Seyi (09:08)
And she and a few other advocacy groups were successful in the end in finally getting their voices heard and the voices of the people heard. And if I remember correctly, one of the comments she made was, if only they'd had conversations with the residents, this might have gone much further than they planned.

Reza (09:13)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Interesting, So that's a really good segue into, I love how you brought that up because that's a really good segue into smarter cities that are getting it right, which our key thesis and we talked about this last time as well is it's not the technology that's going to make the difference. It's how you engage the community to know whether that technology will actually benefit them or not. So, you know,

Seyi (09:44)
Yeah.

Reza (09:59)
So I'm going to flip the script. I'm going to look at cities that are integrating technology, not just to become smart cities, but smarter and in ways that directly support community well-being, environmental sustainability and inclusive governance. So I have three examples here of Barcelona, Seoul and Curitiba in Brazil. So let's pick Barcelona first.

Seyi (10:09)
Yeah.

Reza (10:25)
They have been a leader in digital sovereignty, the idea that technology should be under democratic control. What they did well, so in each one of these, I'll talk about what went well and some of the outcomes they got because those outcomes really reflect things that got better. So in Barcelona, they developed a Barcelona Digital City Plan with explicit focus on citizen empowerment. They implemented an open source platform called Desidim. I'm not sure if I'm pronouncing that right.

For participatory democracy, it enables over 40,000 residents to contribute to city planning and budget decisions. So they're engaged from a community grassroots level. And they mandated that the vendors use open standards and share data with the city. So there's less of this issue about what happens with the data and what happens with the technology. And the results, here are the outcomes. 30 % reduction in water usage through smart irrigation systems.

75 million euros annual savings through smart lighting, 47,000 new jobs in the technology sector, and the shift has led to a 30 % increase in citizen participation and policymaking from 2016 to 2021. And so Barcelona really shows how tech can deepen democracy and build trust when it's grounded in public value. So that's the first example there. The second one is Seoul, South Korea. So we moved to Asia.

Seyi (11:45)
Yeah.

Reza (11:50)
from Europe and really the headline here is digital inclusion as a public good and their strategy was about universal digital access not just smart apps or smart technology and what they did well was they created citizen-led innovation spaces in underserved neighborhoods. is a really good key point. They deployed smart technologies to improve public transportation accessibility, so opening up this public good.

And the city invested over $1.3 billion in public Wi-Fi, high-speed Wi-Fi and digital literacy programs. And here are the outcomes. Public transportation ridership increased by 30%. I love hearing that. It's amazing that they actually had that great number of outcomes. 400,000 senior citizens trained in digital skills. How often do we talk about that type of inclusion? This is great. This is a great number. 60 % reduction in emergency response times. I mean, that is a...

Seyi (12:37)
you

Yeah.

Reza (12:50)
public good, you're helping your citizens there. 15 % reduction in carbon emissions from transportation, especially because of some of this public transportation improvements. Over 95 % of households in Seoul have access to high speed internet. I mean, talk about digital inclusion and the SMART Seoul 2.0 initiative now includes AI powered eldercare services, real time air quality monitoring.

targeted especially at vulnerable populations. actually thinking about the parts of the city that really need this. And so all of this has led to a 70 % increase in digital surface usage by low income and elderly residents, showing how inclusion improves resilience. All these words are just like, we keep repeating them in every episode, but they keep coming up. Last example is Curitiba, Brazil. I love that this is an example.

You know, not from Europe or a highly developed country like Korea, but Brazil, you know, still developing and growing. And it's great to see the leadership that they've had with smart mobility and human centered, really human centered design. So they're not really seen as a tech leader. You don't hear Cotiba Brazil as, you know, it's not on your mind if you think about tech type cities, but they are pioneering using low tech solutions with smart design. Again, they're taking

the constraints that they have and finding good ways to design around it. So it created the first bus rapid transit system in the seventies, which made it really cost effective, efficient and scalable. So even from back then, they were thinking about how do we do these things well. Today, Kurtiba is using data analytics to optimize those routes and reduce emissions. And the result, again, a small example here, but the result is public transport accounts for 70 % of daily trips.

And Curitiba has one of the lowest per capita CO2 emissions in Brazil. think about, like, it's not a super sophisticated solution, but it's a powerful outcome that you get it. And my bottom line on this one is what made Curitiba smarter wasn't the technology. It was how technology supported a broader strategy of equitable mobility and environmental sustainability. So I'm going to pause over there.

Seyi (14:56)
Yeah.

Reza (15:06)
It just gratifies me to see all these examples and the outcomes that they got.

Seyi (15:11)
And rightly so, rightly so. I can't think of any other comments to make other than to read the laws because it absolutely follows on from the fantastic examples you've just shared. And the first law we'll share here is law number 12, which is that participatory governance leads to better community outcomes. You mentioned the word inclusive a lot of times and

The idea behind this law is that inclusive decision making processes involving diverse community members lead to more equitable and effective urban policies, period. And this is based on the research from Einstein around 1969. Again, not too far from when the Curitiba bus rapid transit system came in. That was 1969.

Reza (16:08)
Yeah.

Seyi (16:08)
The

system started in 1970, maybe they consulted with Einstein. And it talks about the ladder of citizen participation, highlighting the importance of meaningful citizen involvement in urban planning. And the consequence is what you've seen in some of the not so good examples, which is that policies that don't address community needs lead to public support.

Reza (16:15)
Yeah.

Seyi (16:38)
lack of public support for some of these urban initiatives. The sidewalk example is a perfect representation of the negative effect of not consulting with the residents that are supposed to quote unquote benefit from the initiatives you're trying to implement. The second law that we thought was relevant here is law number 14.

which is that digital inclusion ensures equal opportunities. Equitable access to digital infrastructure and skills is essential for full participation in modern life. And you gave that example of 400,000 senior citizens trained in digital skills. And it's almost like the law was written based on that example. The importance

Reza (17:23)
Mm-hmm

Yeah.

Seyi (17:35)
of inclusion is very clear as we found from research from Karagalu in 2011. in his research, he just emphasized the importance of that to provide an opportunities for all the residents of the city, not just some. And this idea of a rising tide lifts all boats. If everyone has the requisite skills and

just the capacity capabilities to contribute, the city improves as a result. So it's amazing to see that example. And digital exclusion just worsens inequalities. We know that, we've seen it time and time again with this limiting access to education, job opportunities, public services. So as much as we can...

maintain law number 14, digital inclusion, ensuring equal opportunities. Cities will and can claim to be smarter cities than just dropping some technology in place and hoping some cooperation makes money.

Reza (18:51)
Yeah, yeah, it's so interesting how the laws just are echoes of what these cities have done well and we see the outcomes. We're not theoretically talking about this. We actually see the results of why they're better. And so, Shea, with that, I'm going to segue into our strategic foresight, you know, where smarter cities go next, you know, here.

Seyi (19:01)
Yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah.

Reza (19:21)
the five predictions that I have. Four are pretty, you know, pretty, I think pretty solid. And then the fifth one is kind of out there, you know, a little out there. I'm pulling a little Shae over here on the fifth one. I'm inspired by you. So let's start with the first one, which is what I call digital public infrastructure. And I predict over here that cities that succeed will treat digital systems as part of public infrastructure.

Seyi (19:29)
Go for it. Go for it. You should go for it, please.

Reza (19:51)
subject to democratic rules, not corporate algorithms. They will ensure technological benefits reach all residents through digital literacy programs, like we talked about those examples, affordable connectivity, accessible services. And so expect more public interest tech models and civic data trust, the opposite of like private corporations trying to profit from this type of approach. So that's one. The second one is community led innovation. Co-design will become the norm.

They will create formal structures for citizen participation and technology decisions, especially from marginalized communities. Cities like Amsterdam are already implementing citizen digital rights charters and pilot projects that start with the lived experience rather than tech specs. And this really resonates with me as a product manager. You always start with the user in mind. You spend a lot of time building that deep empathy with the user so that you're not just

building solutions that you think are good ideas, but you're really thinking about how the solution benefits the user. So this is very much in line with that. The third one is measuring what matters. And I think this is an important one. Future smart cities, smarter cities will move beyond KPIs like congestion or bandwidth and towards metrics like wellbeing, social cohesion, trust, ecological health. These KPIs really prioritize the

purpose of what the technology is trying to do rather than the technology. For instance, Paris now tracks 15 minute access to essential services as a core urban metric. And so it's very purposeful in what they're trying to accomplish. It's the outcome and the benefit to the community that they care about. And so if you reframe that way, you're going to have more success. The number four, resilience through redundancy.

We've touched on this before with growing climate shock, cyber threats. Cities will need to invest in decentralized systems, mesh networks, off-grid energy, hyper local food systems. We brought this up multiple times in episodes in the past. And the technology will support, not replace, community capacity. It will enable these things to happen to make those cities more resilient. And number five, and this is my Shea three pointer,

which I call cognitive cities. So I think the most promising future direction, the prediction that I have, is the evolution from smart cities to cognitive cities, urban environments that learn from citizen behaviors and adapt to their needs while respecting their privacy and agency. And so this will represent a shift from seeing technology as a solution to seeing it as an enabler of human flourishing. What do you think, Shea?

Seyi (22:44)
No, absolutely awesome list here Reza. It is so I'll pick on one to touch on that I think runs a thread through everything. It's the measuring what matters one and this idea that if you just shift your gaze a little bit, shift your framing a little bit and focus on what the needs are and consequently.

pull out the solutions from there, you change everything. You're working from the needs, not the technology, and measuring the improvements in those needs and the meeting of those needs, not some metric that some company has brought as the value prop they're trying to sell to you.

Reza (23:15)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Seyi (23:41)
I love the list. Thank you for the Shays in there. combined, they're all pretty good strategic foresight and ideas for how we can make smarter cities. Because we do want technology to aid thriving and community. We just need it to work to address

Reza (23:51)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Seyi (24:09)
problems we truly have.

Reza (24:09)
Yeah. Yeah,

I love how you brought it back down really to the key factor there about the reframing of like, what are you measuring? And I almost feel like this 15 minute access to essential services is a thread that we need to pull on. Maybe there's an episode that's coming on that. But you really, so here's my closeout before we close out.

Seyi (24:20)
Yeah.

Absolutely. Absolutely.

Reza (24:38)
before we move to the next part of the episode, which is our mailbag. really what being a smarter city, if we've learned anything from this discussion, it's asking, it's not about like sensors or dashboards, it's really asking who benefits, who decides, it's those outcomes. It's one that uses the technology to deepen that belonging, which we talk about all the time, build that collective resilience, ensure every voice is.

part of shaping that urban future. These cities will use technology to strengthen those community bonds, enhance that democratic participation. And it's really about making it a thriving community, really improving the quality of life for everyone, not just these optimizations of urban systems or serving the privileged few. it's been, yeah, so I've really enjoyed this episode, Jay. This seems to, we've come at it.

Seyi (25:30)
has been a good one.

Reza (25:35)
We've come at this discussion in so many different ways and, you know, Smarter Cities seems to encapsulate a lot of what we've talked about.

Seyi (25:42)
I'm so glad you did this. When you reached out that this would be the one you'd work on, I was like, yeah, you know what? We've bashed it a lot, but there is a reframing and we've used that word a few times on this episode. So thanks so much for diving into this. I've thoroughly enjoyed it. And I hope our listeners have as well. And you have a mail bag for us Reza.

Reza (25:49)
Yes.

Yeah.

Yes, I have a mailbag. This is from my sister-in-law, Nas, who lives in Mumbai. We spent some time together and this was in response to the Future of Mumbai episode. I had lot of conversations with her while I was in Mumbai about many things that we discussed on the episode. And so I warmly and fondly remember those conversations on their porch overlooking the city. Anyway, so she wrote...

And she said that I agree too about your point of interaction in buzzy big cities. When I first used to go to Paris when I was very young for ballet school, I could barely speak the language and it was terribly lonely. But the daily interaction with the checkout lady, the croissant vendor at the kiosk, the nods with the familiar faces taking the metro at the same time every day gave some solace and human connection, however fleeting. It's so true that automation and dig-

digitization isolates us more and more and in some ways, ironically makes our world so much smaller. So she has this contrast between, you know, coming to the city and, you know, it's those connections and those human moments that made her not feel as lonely. And at the same time, we have this technology that makes the world feel smaller that, you we can go anywhere, we can see anything anywhere, but also isolates us. I love how she encapsulated that. That was fantastic.

Seyi (27:14)
Yeah.

Yeah, yeah. It's so good.

It's so good. We've also touched on this idea in a past episode, I believe it was season one, around the micro interactions being so critical for filling a sense of belonging in a city. So thank you so much.

Reza (27:35)
Yeah. Yes.

Yes. I think it was the episode,

the future of community and connection. Yes.

Seyi (27:46)
Exactly, I think it was,

yeah. And so that is such a good example from that. So thank you so much.

Reza (27:53)
Yeah.

So yeah, with that Jay, we come to the close. So let's thank our listeners.

Seyi (27:58)
Yeah. Thank

you so much for anyone who's listened again. We know that this sparks something for a lot of people. So thank you for reaching out. And if this episode has sparked anything for you, please let us know. It's hello at future forward.fm. Share your thoughts, share any corrections you have for anything we might've said that is different. For example, if you live in...

song though and you feel like we've said something that doesn't quite capture your experience, absolutely reach out to let us know and just share this with friends, family, people you think might be interested and people you know will be interested. It all counts towards getting those algorithms to push us up to more people so they can listen and we're just thankful you all keep coming back.

and responding. Until next time, we'll speak to you soon.

Reza (29:02)
Okay, thanks everyone, bye.

Seyi (29:04)
Bye.