Intelligent Transport Solutions for Smart Cities and Regions: Lessons Learned
monetization. The architecture ensures a
common and dependable framework that all
participants can factor into their individual
product road-map and technology plans.
entry for specialist data analytics firms
and application developers thereby
cultivating a competitive marketplace.
In conceptual terms, a shared data exchange
and marketplace for smart cities and regions
involves an environment where data
providers (e.g. owners of sensors, connected
assets, public- and private sector data
streams etc.) can interact with data
consumers. In a fully functioning scenario,
there are many different types of data
consumers. For example, some data
consumers may subscribe to raw data and
handle their own post processing to support
a smart city application. Other users may
specialize in adding value to raw data by
supplying clean or meta data streams to
other application developers and service
providers. And, another category might
specialize in analytics to extract features or
insights that enable smart city services.
For a successful outcome, it was important
to ensure that technology providers did not
impose a solution onto local authority users.
Local authorities needed to have a voice in
the solution design process and to have their
operational and technology concerns
addressed. An important feature of the
project approach was a process of
transparent
communications
with
technology vendors and transport-sector
experts to ensure collaboration and
widespread acceptance on the part of city
authorities .
The first stage before the field-trials phase
took the form of a feasibility study. This drew
upon detailed input from cities, via a task led
by Buckinghamshire County Council, as to
how they perceived their data structures,
their needs and their expectations. This
approach ensured that the customer’s view
took precedence in the solution design
process.
The value of a data marketplace to smart
cities is, first, in creating a low-cost IT
infrastructure to publish and share city data.
Secondly, the marketplace promotes
innovation and economic development by
encouraging app developers, who possess
competencies that most local authorities
lack, to deliver app-based services to city
authorities, residents and the business
community. And, thirdly, revenues from the
marketplace become a new commercial
opportunity for smart cities to generate a
positive financial contribution to their
operating budgets.
With this information, technology vendors
and experts defined a joint solution to fulfill
all the given requirements. Subsequently,
local authorities in the consortium
“translated” technical concepts and
applications into benefits and opportunities,
using the language of internal decision
makers and other authorities, to enable
faster adoption.
The data exchange and marketplace idea,
which standardizes the technical capabilities
to import and export data, also includes
commercial and legal rules for data and app
IIC Journal of Innovation
Since solving smart city problems is not only
a technical issue, a large part of the
challenge is to bring multiple cities and
partners together to stimulate innovation
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