Features of Smart Cities
- Competitiveness: It refers to the city’s ability to create employment opportunities, attract investments, professionals, and labor, and provide an edge to other cities. The ease of doing business and the quality of life-work it offers determines its competitiveness.
- Sustainability: It includes social sustainability, financial sustainability, and environmental sustainability which lasts for the future.
- Quality of Life: It includes inclusiveness, entertainment, ease of obtaining public services, cost-efficient healthcare, quality education, safety and security, transparency and accountability, opportunities for participation in governance, and a pollution-free environment.
- Housing and Inclusiveness: To expand housing opportunities for all; especially for the poor and marginalized.
- Greenery: Increase the aesthetic value of cities by developing greenery within and outside along with well maintained open spaces like the park
- Pollution Fewer cities: Reduce pollution by promoting public transport or establishing facilities for non-motorized transport (e.g. walking and cycling).
- Identity to the city: Based on the main economic activity of the city such as local cuisine, healthcare, education, arts and craft, heritage, sports, textile, dairy, etc; the city can be identified under the Smart City Mission.
- Smart Solutions: For infrastructure and services development use smart solutions. For example, to make cities less vulnerable to disasters, use fewer resources for development, and provide cheaper services to citizens through smart initiatives.
The Core Infrastructure of a Smart City would include the following:
Adequate water supply assured electricity supply, sanitation facilities including solid waste management, efficient urban mobility, eco-friendly public transport, affordable housing especially for the poor and marginalized, robust digitalization and ITC connectivity, Good governance especially e-Governance, inclusive governance and citizen participation, safety, and security of citizens particularly women, children and elderly, health and education facilities and sustainable environment constitute the core infrastructure of Smart City.
Coverage and Duration of Mission:
The Mission covers 100 cities and is being implemented by the Ministry of Urban Development (MoUD) and all state and union territory (UT) governments. Initially, its duration is of 5 years (FY2015-16 to FY2019-20) but the Ministry has extended the timeline to June 2023 due to the Covid pandemic.
Smart City Mission – Features, Strategy and Challenges
Across the world, the pace of migration from rural to urban areas is increasing rapidly. According to United Nations, by 2050, about 68% of the world population will be living in urban areas and India is no exception. While the urban Indian population is currently around 31%(Census, 2011) of the total population, it will be over 50% by 2030 as projected by the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs. Considering the enormous importance of urbanization, Smart City Mission(SSM) has been launched by the Government of India in 2015.
Smart City initiative drives economic growth, improves the quality of life, facilitates local development with the help of digital and information technology, follows best practices of urban planning, utilizes public-private partnerships and policy change through smart solutions. A ‘Smart city’ is an urban area that is highly advanced in terms of sustainable land use, transport & communication, market viability, and overall infrastructure. It is a city where technology is the principal source for providing essential services to residents and focuses on sustainable and inclusive development.