"Smart" Cities!!

sudhir khandelwal
Jul 6, 2015
2 min read

http://indiansmartcities.in/downloads/CONCEPT_NOTE_-3.12.2014__REVISED_AND_LATEST_.pdf

Ok, This is not to be an entertaining note so, I d write the byline for the last at first!!

Which third class journalists did they hire to write this note on “smart cities”?!!

Honestly, I went through the forty six page document!! Friends who can- please go through the whole document!! For others:

“A Smart city is one that has the following:

: Competiveness

: Sustainability

: Quality of life “

Hmmm. Aren’t all cities to be these & more?

“ The general appearance of the “smart city” has to be pleasing & Clean. Page 9.That’s all that Urban design is about?
“A 100 Mpbs internet backbone coupled with 100% coverage of all the area by cell phone towers and a high level of telephone penetration will be essential to a smart city as most services will have to be offered online.”

Page 12.

Your maid & driver is certainly not living here!!)

“ Good entertainment facilities make the people in a city happy” Page 13.

Is there a definition to this jingoism?!!)

“ a self healing smart grid” page 16.

Here is the agenda of the technology companies!!

“The HPEC ( high powered expert committee!!-) has calculated the costs to be Rs. 43386 PCIC ( per capita investment cost) over twenty years!!” page 23.

Not bad!! But considering the private companies are going to invest most of all this, be ready to be sucked back!!

The CRF ( citizen reference framework)!! Page 25.

It’s a lot of fun to read!! Also that they are going to take in the aspirations of residents of the city, who actually are in the future!!)

The guideline benchmark of population density is 175 pph on high transit links!! Page 34. “spatial planning”

There is a book on urban planning by Rangwala that can be referred!!)

9. & the only thing worth reading is the definition of the smart city by IBM as “ One that makes optimal use of all the interconnected information available today to better understand and control its operations and optimize the use of limited resources” Page 32.