Groups, individuals work on smart moves to make smart cities
By
Krithika Krishnamurthy, ET Bureau | 22 Jan, 2015, 04.08AM IST
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| Narendra Modi
BENGALURU: The 'Smart City' initiative of the
Narendra Modi
government has so far been a centralised effort: identifying large players, marking boundaries within cities to build out a working model. Parallel to this, groups and individuals are working towards the same goal of making the city smart, but with a markedly different approach.
Some of these people are trying to crowd source information about matters such as weather, pollution and noise — data atop which technologists can build visualisations or applications. This can then be used by people to make everyday decisions such as whether to take the umbrella while leaving for office, or renting a house in an area where pollution is less. For authorities, the data would be useful to set standards and regulations.
Thejesh GN, an independent technologist, developer and data enthusiast, is aiming to address the above issues through his contributions to the 'Sense Your City' initiative, an international online open data programme.
Since last week, about 100 people in seven cities — Boston, Rio de Janeiro, Bengaluru, Singapore, Shanghai, Geneva and San Francisco — have started gathering data with the use of open source and do-it-yourself (DIY) environmental sensors.
Fourteen of those sensors are installed in Bengaluru and Thejesh has installed one outside his house to measure air quality, noise, pollution, light and temperature.
The goal of the project, which will collect data for three months, is bringing together technologists and government to have an open dialog about data and how best to use it to plan cities and derive in sights from one another.
The initiative — funded by swissnex San Francisco, Lift Conference, and Gray Area Foundation — will analyse the collected data and derive civic impact. What one wants to do with the data is limited by one's imagination, said swissnex, a network of science and technology outposts to connect Switzerland with innovation hubs across the world.
Thejesh, also a co-founder of data science community DataMeet, is planning to make recommendations to the government on smart city: What data will be opened up to the public, who holds licenses, among others.
The Smart Cities draft concept note, released by the Institute of Urban Transport last year, noted that city governance should be reformed such that "decisions will be taken at the local level and with well-established processes through which citizens can actively participate in such decision making" — something that these individuals are trying to do.
"Indian school education often focuses on the climate and geography of India and the world, but we never learn enough about how things work in our city or town," said Pavan Srinath, who runs Know Your Climate, a not-for-profit that was started in 2011 to tell data-driven stories on Bengaluru's weather and climate.
Some of these people are trying to crowd source information about matters such as weather, pollution and noise — data atop which technologists can build visualisations or applications. This can then be used by people to make everyday decisions such as whether to take the umbrella while leaving for office, or renting a house in an area where pollution is less. For authorities, the data would be useful to set standards and regulations.
Thejesh GN, an independent technologist, developer and data enthusiast, is aiming to address the above issues through his contributions to the 'Sense Your City' initiative, an international online open data programme.
Since last week, about 100 people in seven cities — Boston, Rio de Janeiro, Bengaluru, Singapore, Shanghai, Geneva and San Francisco — have started gathering data with the use of open source and do-it-yourself (DIY) environmental sensors.
Fourteen of those sensors are installed in Bengaluru and Thejesh has installed one outside his house to measure air quality, noise, pollution, light and temperature.
The goal of the project, which will collect data for three months, is bringing together technologists and government to have an open dialog about data and how best to use it to plan cities and derive in sights from one another.
The initiative — funded by swissnex San Francisco, Lift Conference, and Gray Area Foundation — will analyse the collected data and derive civic impact. What one wants to do with the data is limited by one's imagination, said swissnex, a network of science and technology outposts to connect Switzerland with innovation hubs across the world.
Thejesh, also a co-founder of data science community DataMeet, is planning to make recommendations to the government on smart city: What data will be opened up to the public, who holds licenses, among others.
The Smart Cities draft concept note, released by the Institute of Urban Transport last year, noted that city governance should be reformed such that "decisions will be taken at the local level and with well-established processes through which citizens can actively participate in such decision making" — something that these individuals are trying to do.
"Indian school education often focuses on the climate and geography of India and the world, but we never learn enough about how things work in our city or town," said Pavan Srinath, who runs Know Your Climate, a not-for-profit that was started in 2011 to tell data-driven stories on Bengaluru's weather and climate.
