new urban policies.19 Then, between 2010 and 2015, some other infrastructure needs, but it also underpins key strategies metropolises, including some greenfield cities,20 launched for managing energy use and for combatting poverty, inequality, ambitious projects to create a new city from almost nothing. and unemployment. A greenfield city is a city that has been built from scratch on previously undeveloped land. Greenfield city projects are Fundamentally, city authorities have to overcome the growing therefore not constrained by prior development or existing complexities of city management. Moreover, at an international urban policies, meaning that turning them into smart and policy level, environmental sustainability concerns are integral sustainable cities may be easier. In this period, planners to the concept of the smart city, with many smart city initiatives thought that integration of sustainable, smart, and efficient focused on air qual y,cean energy, or transport solutions. The principles in planning and design from the early phases of smart city concept provides a lens through which to look at the the project would be the best way to make cities that embrace city as a system. On this basis, smart city projects are about those principles. The next period, 2015-2025, has been and will modeling scenarios and policy interventions. Depending on be much more focused on the formalization of projects and their scale, they offer opportunities to prototype and test new on competition to appear at the top of rankings of best cities. solutions. The target is to deliver new social infrastructure. That period is the core focus of this ebook. The final period covers the years beyond 2025; many studies forecast that by Many scholars and actors now take the view that the smart city that point more and more cities will serve as laboratories that concept promotes cross sector collaboration and partnership foster innovation, partnerships, and impactful initiatives. among stakeholders. It is a space for developing collective strategies for social innovation. Its stakeholders include private As the above time frame indicates, the smart city concept companies, public decision makers, civil society (citizens, emerged in the first few years of the twenty-first century. Back associations, NGOs), and external parties such as startups, then, it was a means for collecting data through using sensors, academic institutes, or venture capital funds. Moreover, the information and communication technologies (ICT), and Internet smart city concept assumes that a city should be a creative, of things (IoT) platforms.21 Thanks to these technologies, the sustainable area that improves its inhabitants’ quality of life and ability to collate information from different sources is making it creates a friendlier environment. Smart cities offer stronger possible to inform and therefore improve management of cities’ prospects for economic development. services. Interventions that aim to achieve the prevailing strategic During the first two periods, technology companies aggressively objectives that are driving contemporary development include marketed such visions and technological approaches. After the mechanisms that focus on shared outcomes for change. financial crash of 2008, IT consulting companies, backed by car Actors are focusing on aspects that appeal to the whole manufacturers, encouraged cash-strapped city governments ecosystem within areas such as health and well-being, energy to think about ICT as the solution to all bottlenecks (process, independence, or technology-led change. Smart city projects content, integration, and decentralization of information) should create social value and enhance the common good. and urban problems (for example, multiparty collaboration, transparency, and service-delivery channels). Smart cities are no longer driven by technology alone. Sustainability is now their clearest main priority. The smart city The criticism of this approach to the challenges facing cities is must be sustainable and inclusive. Smart cities are above all that it is almost exclusively technological in its scope. However, supposed to be lively, constantly evolving spaces where anyone in the last decade, a broader understanding of what a smart city should be able to propose innovations to improve how they are might be has gained considerable popularity. It is enabling cities organized and run. to better meet their residents’ housing, transport, energy, and (19) In 1974, Los Angeles created the first urban big data project: a report called A Cluster Analysis of Los Angeles. Then, in 1994, Amsterdam created a virtual “digital city” (De Digital Stad) to promote Internet usage. In Scandinavia, we have also found some good examples of early funding of smart city initiatives. In these Nordic cases, the national government relieved city governments of the role of funding research and startups, allowing city governments to focus on funding smart city projects directly. Examples here include Innovation Norway, Sweden’s Vinnova, and Innovation Fund Denmark’s Grand Solutions. (20) In a 2018 report, the McKinsey Global Institute identified a small sample of six greenfield projects (Songdo, South Korea; Belmont, Arizona, USA; The Quayside area of Toronto, Canada; NEOM, Saudi Arabia; Masdar City, United Arab Emirates; and Dholera, India). Two are just projects at this time, and another one is a large area in an existing city (Toronto). https://medium.com/mckinsey-global-institute/smart-from-the-start-6-examples-of-greenfield-smart-city-projects-from-around- the-globe-2db82ac702e9. Announced in 2020, the Toyota project to build a prototype “city of the future” at the base of Mt. Fuji in Japan is called the “Woven City.” https://global.toyota/en/newsroom/corporate/31221914.html (accessed on 24 March 2021). (21) In 2005, Cisco put up twenty-five million dollars over five years for research into smart cities. In 2008, IBM’s Smarter Planet project investigated applying sensors, networks, and analytics to urban issues. Finally, in 2009, IBM unveiled a fifty-million-dollar Smarter Cities campaign to help cities run more efficiently. 33 Quélin and Smadja | HEC PARIS | SMART CITIES | The sustainable program of six leading cities | 2021