Smart Devolution


New report by Eddie Copeland and Cameron Scott at Policy Exchange: “Elected mayors should be required to set up an Office of Data Analytics comprising of small, expert teams tasked with using public and privately held data to create smarter and more productive cities.

A new paper, Smart Devolution, by leading think tank Policy Exchange says that most cities have vast quantities of data that if accessed and used effectively could help improve public services, optimise transport routes, support the growth of small businesses and even prevent cycling accidents.

The report highlights how every UK city should use the additional powers they receive from Whitehall to replicate New York by employing a small team of data experts to collect and collate information from a range of sources, including councils, emergency services, voluntary organisations, mobile phone networks and payment systems.

The data teams will provide city mayors with a great opportunity to break down the silos that exist between local authorities and public sector bodies when it comes to unlocking information that could save money and improve the standard of living for the public.

Examples of how a better use of data could make our cities smarter include:

  • Preventing cycling accidents: HGVs travelling through city centres should be required to share their GPS data with the city mayor’s Office for Data Analytics. Combining HGV routes with data from cyclists obtained by their mobile phone signals could provide real time information showing the most common routes shared by large lorries and cyclists. City leaders could then put in place evidence based policy responses, for example, prioritising spending on new bike lanes or updating cyclists via an app of the city’s most dangerous routes.
  • Spending smarter: cities could save and residents benefit from the analysis of  anonymised spend and travel information to understand where investment and services are needed based on real consumer decisions. Locating schools, transport links and housing when and where it is needed. This also applies to business investment with data being harnessed to identify fruitful locations….(More)”

‘Design thinking’ is changing the way we approach problems


Tim Johnson in University Affairs on “Why researchers in various disciplines are using the principles of design to solve problems big and small” : “A product of the same trends and philosophies that gave us smartphones, laptop computers and internet search engines, design thinking is changing the way some academics approach teaching and research, the way architects design classrooms and how leaders seek to solve the world’s most persistent problems.

Cameron Norman is a long-time supporter of design thinking (or DT) and an adjunct lecturer at the University of Toronto’s Dalla Lana School of Public Health. He notes that designers, especially product designers, are typically experts in conceptualizing problems and solving them– ideal skills for tackling a wide range of issues, from building a better kitchen table to mapping out the plans on a large building. “The field of design is the discipline of innovation,” he says. “[Design thinking] is about taking these methods, tools and ideas, and applying them in other areas.”

Design thinking centres on the free flow of ideas – far-out concepts aren’t summarily dismissed – and an unusually enthusiastic embrace of failure. “Design thinkers try to figure out what the key problem is – they look around and try to understand what’s going on, and come up with some wild ideas, thinking big and bold, on how to solve it,” Dr. Norman says. “They assume they’re not going to get it right the first time.”

If you were looking to build a better mousetrap, you’d prototype a model, test it for weaknesses, then either trash it and start again, or identify the problems and seek to correct them. DT does the same thing, but in an increasingly broad array of areas, from social policy to healthcare to business.

Deborah Shackleton, dean of design and dynamic media at Emily Carr University of Art + Design in Vancouver, was an early adopter of DT. “Design thinking is a mindset. You can use it as a tool or a technique. It’s very adaptable,” she says.

In 2005, ECUAD revamped much of its curriculum in design and dynamic media, looking to shift the focus from more traditional methods of research, like literature reviews, to something called “generative research.” “It’s the idea that you would invite the participants – for whom the design is intended – to be part of the creation process,” Dr. Shackleton says. She adds that various tools, like “co-creation kits” (which include a range of activities to engage people on a variety of cognitive and emotional levels) and ethnographic and cultural probes (activities which help participants demonstrate details about their private lives to their design partners), prove very useful in this area.

Collaboration among various fields is an important part of the design thinking process. At the University of Alberta, Aidan Rowe, an associate professor in design studies, is using design thinking to help the City of Edmonton improve services for people who are homeless. “Design is a truly interdisciplinary discipline,” says Dr. Rowe. “We always need someone to design with and for. We don’t design for ourselves.”….

Design thinkers often speak of “human-centered design” and “social innovation,” concepts that flow from DT’s assertion that no single person has the answer to a complex problem. Instead, it focuses on collective goals and places a premium on sustainability, community, culture and the empowerment of people, says Greg Van Alstyne, director of research and co-founder of the Strategic Innovation Lab, or sLab, at OCAD University. “It means you go about your problem-solving in a more holistic way. We can say ‘human-centered,’ but it’s actually ‘life-centered,’” Mr. Van Alstyne explains. “Our brand of design thinking is amenable to working within social systems and improving the lot of communities.”

 

Design thinking is also transforming university campuses in a tangible way. One example is at the University of Calgary’s Taylor Institute for Teaching and Learning, which is undergoing a $40-million renovation. “The whole space is designed to help students connect, communicate, collaborate and create knowledge,” says Lynn Taylor, vice-provost, teaching and learning. “Traditional learning was focused on the facts and concepts and procedures of a discipline, and we’re moving toward the goal of having students think far more deeply about their learning.”

To create this new space within a two-floor, 4,000-square-metre building that formerly served as an art museum, the university turned to Diamond Schmitt Architects, who have designed similar spaces at a number of other Canadian campuses. The new space, scheduled to open in February, prioritizes flexibility, with movable walls and collapsible furniture, and the seamless integration of technology.

Lead architect Don Schmitt observes that in a traditional campus building, which usually contains a long corridor and individual classrooms, conversation tends to gravitate to the only true public space: the hallway. “There’s a sense that more learning probably happens outside the classroom or between the classrooms, than happens inside the classroom,” he says.

Gone is the old-model lecture hall, with fixed podium and chairs. They’ve been replaced by a much more malleable space, which in a single day can act as a dance studio, movie theatre, lecture space, or just a big area for students to get together. “It’s about individual learning happening informally, quiet study, gregarious social activity, group study, group projects, flexible studio environments, changeable, ‘hack-able’ spaces and lots of flexibility to use different places in different ways,” Mr. Schmitt explains….(More)”

Privacy, security and data protection in smart cities: a critical EU law perspective


CREATe Working Paper by Lilian Edwards: “Smart cities” are a buzzword of the moment. Although legal interest is growing, most academic responses at least in the EU, are still from the technological, urban studies, environmental and sociological rather than legal, sectors2 and have primarily laid emphasis on the social, urban, policing and environmental benefits of smart cities, rather than their challenges, in often a rather uncritical fashion3 . However a growing backlash from the privacy and surveillance sectors warns of the potential threat to personal privacy posed by smart cities . A key issue is the lack of opportunity in an ambient or smart city environment for the giving of meaningful consent to processing of personal data; other crucial issues include the degree to which smart cities collect private data from inevitable public interactions, the “privatisation” of ownership of both infrastructure and data, the repurposing of “big data” drawn from IoT in smart cities and the storage of that data in the Cloud.

This paper, drawing on author engagement with smart city development in Glasgow as well as the results of an international conference in the area curated by the author, argues that smart cities combine the three greatest current threats to personal privacy, with which regulation has so far failed to deal effectively; the Internet of Things(IoT) or “ubiquitous computing”; “Big Data” ; and the Cloud. While these three phenomena have been examined extensively in much privacy literature (particularly the last two), both in the US and EU, the combination is under-explored. Furthermore, US legal literature and solutions (if any) are not simply transferable to the EU because of the US’s lack of an omnibus data protection (DP) law. I will discuss how and if EU DP law controls possible threats to personal privacy from smart cities and suggest further research on two possible solutions: one, a mandatory holistic privacy impact assessment (PIA) exercise for smart cities: two, code solutions for flagging the need for, and consequences of, giving consent to collection of data in ambient environments….(More)

Citizen’s Right to the Digital City


New book edited by Marcus Foth, Martin Brynskov, and Timo Ojala “…this book brings together case studies and examples from around the world to discuss the role that urban interfaces, citizen action, and city making play in the quest to create and maintain not only secure and resilient, but productive, sustainable and viable urban environments. The book debates the impact of these trends on theory, policy and practice. The individual chapters are based on blind peer reviewed contributions by leading researchers working at the intersection of the social / cultural, technical / digital, and physical / spatial domains of urbanism scholarship. The book will appeal not only to researchers and students, but also to a vast number of practitioners in the private and public sector interested in accessible content that clearly and rigorously analyses the potential offered by urban interfaces, mobile technology, and location-based services in the context of engaging people with open, smart and participatory urban environments….(More)”

This Is How Visualizing Open Data Can Help Save Lives


Alexander Howard at the Huffington Post: “Cities are increasingly releasing data that they can use to make life better for their residents online — enabling journalists and researchers to better inform the public.

Los Angeles, for example, has analyzed data about injuries and deaths on its streets and published it online. Now people can check its conclusions and understand why LA’s public department prioritizes certain intersections.

The impact from these kinds of investments can lead directly to saving lives and preventing injuries. The work is part of a broader effort around the world to make cities safer.

Like New York City, San Francisco and Portland, Oregon, Los Angeles has adopted Sweden’s “Vision Zero” program as part of its strategy for eliminating traffic deathsCalifornia led the nation in bicycle deaths in 2014.

At visionzero.lacity.org, you can see that the City of Los Angeles is using data visualization to identify the locations of “high injury networks,” or the 6 percent of intersections that account for 65 percent of the severe injuries in the area.

CITY OF LOS ANGELES

The work is the result of LA’s partnership with University of South California graduate students. As a result of these analyses, the Los Angeles Police Department has been cracking down on jaywalking near the University of Southern California.

Abhi Nemani, the former chief data officer for LA, explained why the city needed to “go back to school” for help.

“In resource-constrained environments — the environment most cities find themselves in these days — you often have to beg, borrow, and steal innovation; particularly so, when it comes to in-demand resources such as data science expertise,” he told the Huffington Post.

“That’s why in Los Angeles, we opted to lean on the community for support: both the growing local tech sector and the expansive academic base. The academic community, in particular, was eager to collaborate with the city. In fact, most — if not all — local institutions reached out to me at some point asking to partner on a data science project with their graduate students.”

The City of Los Angeles is now working with another member of its tech sector toeliminate traffic deaths. DataScience, based in Culver City, California, received $22 million dollars in funding in December to make predictive insights for customers.

“The City of Los Angeles is very data-driven,” DataScience CEO Ian Swanson told HuffPost. “I commend Mayor Eric Garcetti and the City of Los Angeles on the openness, transparency, and availability of city data initiatives, like Vision Zero, put the City of Los Angeles‘ data into action and improve life in this great city.”

DataScience created an interactive online map showing the locations of collisions involving bicycles across the city….(More)”

Digital Weberianism: Towards a reconceptualization of bureaucratic social order in the digital age


Working Paper by Chris Muellerleile & Susan Robertson: “The social infrastructures that the global economy relies upon are becoming dependent on digital code, big data, and algorithms. At the same time the digital is also changing the very nature of economic and social institutions. In this paper we attempt to make sense of the relationships between the emergence of digitalism, and transformations in both capitalism, and the ways that capitalism is regulated by digitized social relations. We speculate that the logic, rationalities, and techniques of Max Weber’s bureau, a foundational concept in his theory of modernity, helps explain the purported efficiency, objectivity, and rationality of digital technologies. We argue that digital rationality constitutes a common thread of social infrastructure that is increasingly overdetermining the nature of sociality. We employ the example of the smart city and the digitizing university to expose some of the contradictions of digital order, and we end by questioning what digital order might mean after the end of modernity….(More)”

50 states, 50 public records stories


 at Poynter: “I try to feature journalists who are telling important stories using public records. For my final column of 2015, I wanted to do something big and decided to find public records stories from all 50 states (plus, a bonus: Washington, D.C.).

This is not meant to be a “best of” list. It’s simply a collection of public records stories from the past year that intrigued me. I found many of the stories by searching the National Freedom of Information Coalition’s website, as well as Investigative Reporters & Editors.…check out my list of public records stories from around the country and see what records journalists are requesting.  It’s full of great story ideas:

Alabama

Auburn spent $1.67 million on Outback Bowl trip

(Montgomery Advertiser)

Auburn spent more than $1.6 million on its Outback Bowl trip, according to the Institutional Bowl Expense report summary submitted to the NCAA and released in response to a Freedom of Information Act request.

Alaska

KMXT sues Kodiak City for documents in police brutality case

(KMXT)

The public radio station filed suit against the City of Kodiak to get records from police after three officers handcuffed and pepper-sprayed a man with autism.

Arizona

Legislature redacts, delays and denies access to messages

(Arizona Capitol Times)

The newspaper requested electronic messages sent among top state elected officials of both parties and their top staff. But getting access to those messages was difficult.

Arkansas

Some question email deletion policies

(Arkansas News)

After the state treasurer’s office instituted a policy requiring employees to delete all emails after 30 days, critics questioned whether it was necessary and whether it was consistent with the spirit of open government.

California

Collapsed I-10 bridge given an A rating just last year

(The Desert Sun)

After a bridge collapsed on Interstate 10, the newspaper reviewed Federal Highway Administration data and found that the bridge had been given an “A” rating and one of the highest possible flood safety ratings.

Colorado

Students accuse CU-Boulder of delaying release of debate documents

(Daily Camera)

University of Colorado students accused administrators of dragging their feet on an open records request the students filed to get letters, emails and documents related to the Republican presidential debate held on campus….(More)”

What Citizens Can Teach Civil Servants About Open Government


 and  in Governing: “An open government is one that is transparent, participatory and collaborative. But moving from traditional government operating behind closed doors to more open institutions, where civil servants work together with citizens to create policies and solve problems, demands new skills and sensibilities.

As more and more American public-sector leaders embrace the concept of openness as a positive force for governmental effectiveness, they would do well to look toward Brazil’s largest city, where an unusual experiment was just launched: an effort to use a variation on crowdsourcing to retrain Sao Paulo’s 150,000 civil servants. It’s described as the world’s largest open-government training program.

The program, known as Agents of Open Government – part of a wider city initiative called “Sao Paulo Aberta” (Open Sao Paulo) — aims to teach through peer-to-peer learning, where government employees learn from citizens. Twenty-four citizen-led courses that began last month are aimed not only at government employees and elected community representatives but also at social activists and the general population.

Sao Paolo is betting on the radical notion that learning can happen outside of formal civil-service training colleges. This initiative reflects a growing global trend toward recognizing that institutions can become smarter — more effective and efficient — by making use of the skills and experience of those outside of government.

Officials hope to have 25,000 participants over the course of the coming year. To encourage public employees’ participation, city workers who attend the courses gain credits in the municipal evaluation system that allow them to get pay raises….(More)”

Danish city uses sensor system to understand Christmas shoppers


Springwise: “The success of a Christmas market or winterfete doesn’t always translate to money spent, it may simply increase foot traffic or visitor dwell time. Now, the Danish city of Aalborg is measuring exactly those quantities during its busy Christmas shopping period, using Bliptrack, the sensor system that detects devices that are using wifi.

aalborg-1-bliptrack-wifi-retail-smartcities

We have already seen Bliptrack used in JFK airport to let passengers know their wait times. Now, Aalborg City Business Association has installed the system in the city centre to track visitor behavior.

The system consists of a number of sensors placed around the city, which detect nearby wifi devices such as smartphones and tablets. As a pedestrian or car moves around from point to point, they are detected by each sensor. Each device has a unique MAC address, meaning the system is able to track the user’s journey and how long they took to get from one sensor to the next. Aalborg can then use the data collected to understand the impact of events, as well as visitors’ shopping activities. The insights can help them improve business operations such as opening at optimum hours and providing the right amount of staff….(More)”

Smarter as the New Urban Agenda


New book edited by Gil-Garcia, J. Ramon, Pardo, Theresa A., Nam, Taewoo: “This book will provide one of the first comprehensive approaches to the study of smart city governments with theories and concepts for understanding and researching 21st century city governments innovative methodologies for the analysis and evaluation of smart city initiatives. The term “smart city” is now generally used to represent efforts that in different ways describe a comprehensive vision of a city for the present and future. A smarter city infuses information into its physical infrastructure to improve conveniences, facilitate mobility, add efficiencies, conserve energy, improve the quality of air and water, identify problems and fix them quickly, recover rapidly from disasters, collect data to make better decisions, deploy resources effectively and share data to enable collaboration across entities and domains. These and other similar efforts are expected to make cities more intelligent in terms of efficiency, effectiveness, productivity, transparency, and sustainability, among other important aspects. Given this changing social, institutional and technology environment, it seems feasible and likeable to attain smarter cities and by extension, smarter governments: virtually integrated, networked, interconnected, responsive, and efficient. This book will help build the bridge between sound research and practice expertise in the area of smarter cities and will be of interest to researchers and students in the e-government, public administration, political science, communication, information science, administrative sciences and management, sociology, computer science, and information technology. As well as government officials and public managers who will find practical recommendations based on rigorous studies that will contain insights and guidance for the development, management, and evaluation of complex smart cities and smart government initiatives….(More)”