Smart cities need multiple solutions

With so much innovation happening so rapidly, we often forget that technology is really an enabler, not an end. When it comes to smart cities, the end is not dependent on how well the technologies function, but instead on what kind of improvements they actually deliver to citizens and civic leaders.

In my conversations with organizations and C-level officers in municipalities all over the world, it has become clear to me that successful smart cities will be the ones that can offer multiple benefits to a broad range of communities and constituencies. They typically do this through multiple solutions that work well together.

Managing a city can be quite a challenge. On the one hand, city administrators are expected to maintain vibrant, exciting cities that attract new businesses and make people feel safe and comfortable. On the other hand, they must often do so with shrinking budgets, an aging infrastructure, persistent crime rates, and increasing pressure to realize climate targets.
 

As if balancing mounting expectations with flat or diminishing resources were not challenging enough, smart city deployments become more complex as different applications are rolled out. City administrators looking for a single-vendor solution will be disappointed, as no single provider can offer it all.
 

Successful smart cities function like ecosystems, where many players deploy solutions and applications. This in turn requires that an open systems approach in which different applications coexist, integrate at either the device or the software level, and above all share data.

Within the smart city ecosystem, connected lighting offers an attractive place to start. Industry analysts such as Navigant see connected lighting as a platform for future smart city applications.
 

In recent research from infrastructure experts SmartCitiesWorld, nearly half of the city leaders and business executives polled placed connected lighting within their top three priorities, alongside citywide connectivity and urban mobility.

Now is an exciting time for lighting. LED technology—the most significant revolution in the lighting industry since the invention of the light bulb—is now trusted and widely deployed around the world. It is startling to remember that viable LED illumination appeared only about 15 years ago.

Connected lighting further advances digital lighting technology by bringing connected LED luminaries and smart sensors into the Internet of Things. Well-designed connected lighting systems routinely achieve energy savings of as much as 80 percent when compared with conventional lighting.