ICT of the new wave of computing for sustainable urban forms: Their big data and context-aware augmented typologies and design concepts

Abstract

Undoubtedly, sustainable development has inspired a generation of scholars and practitioners in different disciplines into a quest for the immense opportunities created by the development of sustainable urban forms for human settlements that will enable built environments to function in a more constructive and efficient way. However, there are still significant challenges that need to be addressed and overcome. The issue of such forms has been problematic and difficult to deal with, particularly in relation to the evaluation and improvement of their contribution to the goals of sustainable development. As it is an urban world where the informational and physical landscapes are increasingly being merged, sustainable urban forms need to embrace and leverage what current and future ICT has to offer as innovative solutions and sophisticated methods so as to thrive-i.e. advance their contribution to sustainability. The need for ICT of the new wave of computing to be embedded in such forms is underpinned by the recognition that urban sustainability applications are deemed of high relevance to the contemporary research agenda of computing and ICT. To unlock and exploit the underlying potential, the field of sustainable urban planning is required to extend its boundaries and broaden its horizons beyond the ambit of the built form of cities to include technological innovation opportunities. This paper explores and substantiates the real potential of ICT of the new wave of computing to evaluate and improve the contribution of sustainable urban forms to the goals of sustainable development. This entails merging big data and context-aware technologies and their applications with the typologies and design concepts of sustainable urban forms to achieve multiple hitherto unrealized goals. In doing so, this paper identifies models of smart sustainable city and their technologies and applications and models of sustainable urban form and their design concepts and typologies. In addition, it addresses the question of how these technologies and applications can be amalgamated with these design concepts and typologies in ways that ultimately evaluate and improve the contribution of sustainable urban forms to the goals of sustainable development. The overall aim of this paper suits a mix of three methodologies: literature review, thematic analysis, and secondary (qualitative) data analysis to achieve different but related objectives. The study identifies four technologies and two classes of applications pertaining to models of smart sustainable city as well as three design concepts and four typologies related to models of sustainable urban form. Finally, this paper proposes a Matrix to help scholars and planners in understanding and analyzing how the contribution of sustainable urban forms to sustainability can be improved through ICT of the new wave of computing and its novel technologies and applications, as well as a data-centric approach into evaluating this contribution and a simulation method for strategically optimizing it.

Backcasting in futures studies: a synthesized scholarly and planning approach to strategic smart sustainable city development

“…Another definition put forth by [34] (p. 10), which is deductively crafted and based on the concept of sustainable development, states that "a smart sustainable city is a city that meets the needs of its present inhabitants without compromising the ability for other people or future generations to meet their needs, and thus, does not exceed local or planetary environmental limitations, and where this is supported by ICT." This entails unlocking and exploiting the potential of ICT of pervasive computing as an enabling, integrative, and constitutive technology for achieving the environmental, social, and economic goals of sustainability due to the underlying transformational, substantive, and disruptive effects [15,16]. Another conceptualization of the term provided by [14] (p. 11) states: "as a dynamic, complex interplay between scientific innovation, technological innovation, environmental innovation, urban design and planning innovation, institutional innovation, and policy innovation, smart sustainable cities represent and involve inherently complex socio-technical systems of all sorts of innovation systems.…”

“…Therefore, the potential of monitoring, understanding, analyzing, and planning cities through advanced ICT can well be leveraged in advancing sustainability [14,15]. Indeed, smart cities (e.g., [3,9]) and sustainable cities (e.g., [12,16]) that are engaging on the new transition in ICT are getting smarter in achieving the required level of sustainability. As complex systems par excellence, smart sustainable cities rely more and more on sophisticated technologies and their novel applications to realize their full potential and thus respond to the challenge of sustainability.…”

“…The technical features of smart sustainable urban planning involve the application of ICT as a set of scientific and technical processes to land use, natural ecosystems, physical structures, spatial organizations, natural resources, infrastructure systems, socio-economic networks, and citizens' services. Recent evidence (e.g., [3,9,10,12,13,16]) lends itself to the argument that an amalgamation of these strands of urban planning with cutting-edge big data analytics as an advanced form of ICT can help create more sustainable and thus livable, safe, and attractive cities. In all, the data-driven approach to urban planning is of paramount importance to strategic sustainable urban development.…”

“…Sustainable development goals and smart targets should be well understood with respect to their synergy and integration (see, e.g., [1,5,9,12,13,16,19,43]) in the context of city planning, a valuable force for attaining a sort of integrated objectives in the realm of smart sustainable cities. As a management and government function, city planning involves formulating a detailed plan to achieve optimum balance of demands for growth with the available resources and the need to protect the environment, or to provide and maintain a livable and healthy human environment in conjunction with minimal demand on resources and minimal impacts on the environment-by integrating urban strategies with technological innovations as well as formulating and implementing policy regulations and institutional frameworks.…”

“…Especially, smart cities have been criticized for their lack of explicitly incorporating the goals of sustainable development (e.g., [12,34,43]) and sustainable cities for facing difficulties in translating sustainability into the built environment and for evaluating the extent to which different sustainable urban forms contribute to the goals of sustainable development ( [16,31,37,40,78]). Adding to these is the weak or lack of connection between the two urban development strategies, despite the proven role of ICT in supporting cities in their transition towards the needed sustainable development (e.g., [1,19,43]).…”