Smart City Misison

•  The government has selected 27 new smart cities in the latest round of ‘Smart City Challenge’ competition.
• The 27 smart cities announced are from 12 States including 5 from Maharashtra, 4 each from Tamil Nadu and Karnataka, 3 from Uttar Pradesh and 2 each from Punjab and Rajasthan. Nagaland and Sikkim have made it to the smart city list for the first time.
• Amritsar has topped the list. Eight other cities of pilgrim and tourism importance that made to the third list of smart cities are ; Ujjain, Tirupati, Agra, Nashik, Madurai, Thanjavur, Ajmer and Varanasi.
• With this the number of cities selected under Smart City Mission for financing implementation of smart city plans has gone up to 60.
• With this announcement, implementation of smart city plans is now spread over 27 States and UTs.
• 9 States/UTs still to enter implementation phase are; Uttarakhand, J & K, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Arunachal Pradesh, Puducherry, Lakshadweep, Daman & Diu and Dadra, Nagar & Haveli.
• The new 27 smart cities have proposed an investment of Rs.66,883 cr under smart city plans including Rs.42,524 cr under Area Based Development.
• The cities have proposed another Rs.11,379 cr for technology based Pan-city solutions that benefits all the citizens of respective cities.
• With this, the total investment proposed by the 60 cities selected so far has gone up to Rs.1,44,742 cr.

About Smart cities project:

• The concept of smart cities originated at the time when the entire world was facing one of the worst economic crises. In 2008, IBM began work on a 'smarter cities' concept as part of its Smarter Planet initiative. By the beginning of 2009, the concept had captivated the imagination of various nations across the globe.
• Countries like South Korea, UAE and China began to invest heavily into their research and formation. Today, a number of excellent precedents exist that India can emulate, such as those in Vienna, Aarhus, Amsterdam, Cairo, Lyon, Málaga, Malta, the Songdo International Business District near Seoul, Verona etc.
• The India Smart Cities Challenge is a competition designed to inspire and support municipal officials as they develop smart proposals to improve residents' lives. In 2015, cities competed in the first round – with the best proposals receiving funding from the Ministry of Urban Development.
• Smart Cities focus on their most pressing needs and on the greatest opportunities to improve lives. They tap a range of approaches – digital and information technologies, urban planning best practices, public-private partnerships, and policy change – to make a difference.

Analysis:

• Rapid and poorly regulated urbanisation has overwhelmed urban governments, rendering them incapable of providing even basic services such as clean water, sewerage, pedestrian-friendly roads, public transport, uninterrupted power, street lighting, parks and recreational spaces. So weak and uncoordinated is governance that commercial entities have wilfully violated building regulations and put up unauthorised structures — with severe impact on congestion, air quality and flood management — and governments have gladly regularised the violations later.
• The smart city plan proposes to intervene and bring some order by upgrading the physical infrastructure in select enclaves, and incentivising the use of information and communication technologies
• Technologies such as GPS to inform passengers in real time on their mobile phones, and common ticketing, increase the efficiency of transport use.
• Universal design in public buildings and streets would help all people, including those with disabilities.
• The challenge for Smart Cities is to provide proof of concept quickly and make outcomes sustainable. Care also needs to be taken that the effect is not to create gated communities of best practices and civic upgrade in a wider landscape of urban distress. It is crucial that these urban enclaves cater to the housing, health, education and recreation needs of a wide cross section of society, and that the convergence of the Smart Cities programme with existing urban renewal projects countrywide be smooth

By: Vishal