Nordicum - Real Estate Annual Finland 2015 | Page 13

THE ANGLE
By Marja-Leena Rinkineva
The writer is Director of Economic Development, City of Helsinki

Open Helsinki

H

elsinki was once again selected as
one of the top Smart Cities in FastCo.
Being recognised as a Smart City is
exhilarating.
Naturally all the cities want to be
smart, who wouldn’t? But what is there for
Helsinki in “being smart”? How do we want

to develop our city? What makes Helsinki
a special place where to live, work, study
and visit?
Some core values for Helsinki, also
behind smartness, are openness and participation using design as a tool.
My predecessor had a slogan for our

citizens: Use Your City! I also truly believe
that cities are meant to be used, not only
looked at. For us openness and participation
mean many things. On one level they imply
the possibility to utilise and enjoy the city:
parks, public spaces, city services etc. One
of my colleagues had his baby’s name-giving party in a public park. What a wonderful
way to use your city! Also opening all the
data to the public gives you an excellent possibility to use your city. Helsinki has become
renowned for quickly opening up more than
thousand public data sets for anyone to use
and also to build business there upon.
Use Your City also encloses the idea of
a well-designed city. Design is in the DNA
of Helsinki. For cities, design methods imply
permission to do things differently – to take
on a challenging, user-driven, experimental and concrete approach by engaging the
inhabitants of the city. Helsinki has hired a
few designers to really look into how city
services can be formed differently, more
smartly.
On another level openness and participation is the option to take part in democratic
processes, e.g. by voting, expressing opinions in city polls or participating in different activities. Many new digital means have
been invented in Helsinki to increase participation. In urban planning, interactive maps
have been utilised to capture the dreams of
the citizens. In the field of public education,
more than 6,000 parents ac