🌍 October 31 marks World Cities Day, and this year’s theme—"people-centered smart cities"—is all about using digital tools to boost urban life for residents. From safer streets to smoother commutes, tech is stepping up in a big way.
🚀 At the national level, the Chinese mainland’s 14th Five-Year Plan (2021–2025) is turbocharging the digital economy: expanding info networks, building a national big-data center system, and integrating data platforms to power everything from transport to public services.
🏙️ Over at the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development, a new-type smart city model blends urban information modeling (CIM) with smart governance indexes, setting standards for cities to follow.
📊 City-level case studies? Beijing’s Integrated City Operation Management Center taps real-time data from traffic, utilities and emergencies to manage precise traffic dispatches, speed up emergency responses and coordinate public services. Meanwhile, unified electronic medical records and AI diagnostics are leveling up public health in the capital.
🤖 Hangzhou’s "City Brain" uses AI and live data to ease congestion and streamline urban ops, while Shenzhen’s IoT and cloud-based infrastructure has turned it into a living smart city lab.
🌐 On the global front, Chinese firms under the Belt and Road Initiative are exporting these smart-city platforms, driving international standards and data governance frameworks for interconnected urban growth.
💡 As cities in South Asia and Southeast Asia look to the future, China’s people-centered smart cities offer a playbook: when technology focuses on residents’ real needs, innovation and inclusion go hand in hand. Ready to reimagine your city?
Reference(s):
China's experience and global vision for people-centered smart cities
cgtn.com
