ARTICLES

VIDEOS

PODCASTS
BACK TO
FRONT PAGE

Vicky is one of the creators of CLGdotTV, where she also produces and presents programmes. She has 25 years experience of delivering projects in and for public sector organisations including government departments, local authorities, the NHS, and professional associations. Much of her work has been around digitally-enabled innovation and improvement.

@vickysargent

Ask your taxi driver: ‘do you live in a smart city?’

SHARE

Image:
© CLGdotTV

Darren Capes of the IET, Chris Dyer of Yotta and Linda Chandler of Hyperlocal Cities discuss with LGiU’s Ingrid Koehler what ‘smart life’ looks like and the role of councils in shaping it.

In typical ‘smart city’ discussions, agreed our panel, most of the people around the table are from organisations and represent sectors like education, energy, retail, and transport, and in these discussions, people are reduced to personas like ‘commuter’ or ‘consumer’.

But in real life citizens inhabit several personas and there is need for policy-makers to take a more user-centric and joined up approach for the benefits of the smart life – that technology now enables – to be realised (and to be perceived by citizens, including the person providing your taxi ride).

Without this joining up there is a danger that we are sleepwalking into a future none of us desire. And the speed of its arrival may take up by surprise. Compare a photo of a London street in the 1880 with one just 40 years later, by which time petrol driven vehicles had completely replaced horse-drawn equivalents. We are in a period of similarly revolutionary technological change with huge implications for infrastructure planning and the daily lives of citizens.

Local authorities are playing catch up with technology and are yet to fully understand that their effectiveness will be determined by their ability to use, and share wisely, the data they generate.

---oo0oo---
 
Listen to the podcast here
 
Download this podcast - click here then click on the three dots at right hand end of player bar in the new window
 
Browse the full CLGdotPOD podcast library here
 
Set up a free subscription (and alerts) for CLGdotPOD podcasts with iTunes here
 
Set up a free subscription (and alerts) for CLGdotPOD podcasts with Spotify here
 
NB Spotify and iTunes do security moderation and may take 24 hours to make our podcasts available. 

 

 

Back to homepage