Target delivery: start + 4 months 

iii. Framework and Toolbox for Community Insight and Engagement 
o A framework that helps cities determine the tapestry of tools and techniques that 
they could use and the outputs they can expect from each, in order to align and 
agree across the city agencies, and underpin the execution of the plan. 





o A toolbox of methods (adopting / adapting as appropriate; and creating new only 
where necessary) that supports the framework and 




Target delivery – ‘beta’ version: start + 9 months 

iv. Communicating evidence 
o Develop case studies at a city level, and for individual tools / approaches that can 
trigger further action at city level. These clearly should focus on practicalities of 
action and their concrete benefits. 
o In a complementary vain openly communicate leading practices to help building of 
capacity in European cities. 




Target delivery – ‘beta’ version: start + 18 months 

Goal and how the proposed action lives up to our conditions 

The goal is to develop, test, and exploit a common set of tools and methods that help cities to 
understand their citizens and their communities in a better manner. These tools and methods should 
help influence outcomes associated with transformation of the energy chain, and the movement of 
people around cities. Many of these tools and methods can benefit enormously from the use of 
modern ICT (social media, mobile devices, data analytics, cloud computing, sensor technologies, etc). 

Preconditions, e.g. on entities carrying out the action 

Important pre-conditions for success include: 

. Engagement of recognised leaders in this field, within cities academia and Industry 
. Covering the breadth and diversity of European cities 
. Standardisation of pan-European data so that the diversity of European cities becomes clear 
. Involving the key con/prosumers of services in cities: citizens, businesses, visitors etc. 


Methods and details of implementation (how) 

An outline phasing of work could include: 

. Phase 1 Current State Inventory 
. Phase 2 Create model for comparing citizen attitudes and behaviours across cities 
. Phase 3 Create framework and toolbox for insight and engagement 


Monitoring 

The principal mid-term output goal concerns better take-up of common quality tools and methods. 
The longer term outcome goal is the active participation by society in cities to deliver faster, 
cheaper, better the ambitions of the city. Monitoring of the number of cities using the same 
framework should be applied. 

 


4.2.2 Potential Action 2: Energy Neutral Neighbourhoods 

Context 

In many cities community-led initiatives are getting off the ground. Citizens assume responsibility for 
realizing better living conditions in their neighbourhoods. These initiatives often focus on certain 
themes: improving social cohesion, increasing safety and sustainability or neighbourhood 
maintenance. These initiatives are usually not policy driven, but arise from certain needs within the 
community. They are driven by active members of the neighbourhood. The establishment of local 
energy cooperatives, of groups of citizens taking on responsibility for maintenance and security or 
community-led initiatives on reducing social isolation are just a few examples. 

There is an as yet unknown potential in these kinds of initiatives to help achieving broader policy 
objectives. The idea is to stimulate the collaboration between community initiatives, private actors 
and local governments aimed at realizing energy neutral neighbourhoods. 

Goal 

The goal of this action is to stimulate and encourage community-based initiatives through 
introducing an element of competition between neighbourhoods. 

Deliverable 

i. Pilot cities: A neighbourhood competition initiated in 5-10 European cities, challenging 
communities, businesses and local governments to show how community-based initiatives 
can make a difference in realizing goals set by the European Union. These examples will 
generate an inventory on best-practices and lessons learned that can be made available to 
other European cities. 


Target delivery: start + 24 months 

Preconditions 

A number of important preconditions include: 

. Local city budgets 
. Local city champions 
. Industry participation 


Methods and details of implementation 

Cities in Europe should be stimulated to encourage active neighbourhoods to participate in 
challenges that aim at linking and engaging more community-led actions. Visible benefits are needed 
to make it more interesting for communities to participate. Bureaucratic procedures should be 
limited (or be taking care of by the local government) and gains in terms of information exchange, 
better practice improvement etc should be clearly explained. 

 

 


4.2.3 Potential Action 3: Stakeholder Platform for innovation and societal progress 

Context 

We have entered an age in which innovation and societal progress are more and more realized in 
networked environments. New forms of collaboration between government institutions, SME’s, 
international businesses, NGO’s and citizens are developing, supported or enabled by modern ICT 
infrastructures. The city itself is becoming the organizing principle of our time, the city being the 
place where human interaction takes place. 

There is a huge potential for creation and innovation in this networked society enabling cities to 
meet up to the societal challenges we face today. Yet, we hardly understand how these new 
“organizing principles” work or how they can be enhanced. Exchange of ideas and experiences and 
room for experiment are needed, if we aim to unleash the full potential of human interaction 
meeting these challenges. 

Just as there are many small initiatives and local apps and projects that come out of events like hack 
days, governments and service providers can view each little initiative as a pilot for a broader 
initiative, invest in many ideas, see what works and then bring the successful ideas to broader scale, 
if applicable in different geographies. Additionally, such events can be used for co-creation, concept 
validation and usability. Better coordination at a European level can help cities and also Member 
States to better leverage talent and identify, build and scale compelling concepts with support from 
industry. 

Goal 

The goal of this action is to unleash the full creative potential of cities to meet societal challenges 
through the full deployment of modern ICT infrastructures. New models of collaboration and co-
creation in cities are stimulated through the realisation of so called City Platforms, where 
stakeholders of all kinds form “living labs”. The “lessons learned and best practices should be 
transferable or scale-able to other European cities. 

Deliverables 

i. Realizing City Platforms 


A number of leading cities support the development of City Platforms – open to government 
agencies, businesses, NGO’s and citizens. The initial focus should be on energy and 
transport/mobility, but trans-sectoral approaches involving other domains should also be 
stimulated. Target delivery: start + 12 months 

ii. Mentoring Models 


The philosophy behind realizing City Platforms is that these platforms will enhance 
interaction between very different stakeholders and trigger, enable or stimulate the 
development of local networked societies. These city platforms are - in a certain sense – 
living labs, in which new forms of co-creation, entrepreneurship and citizen involvement is 
realized. Best practices of setting these platforms up and successful initiatives, stemming 
from these Platforms, are exchanged between cities (in the geographical sense). 

Target delivery: start + 24 months 

iii. Unified Lab concept to host user engagement, hack days, etc. 


Such a physical platform would include expansion on the Living Lab concept to include a 
space for regular feedback, open discussion and collaboration, e.g. hackdays. These 
activities would cover more topics for citizen discussion and action, e.g. legislative topics. In 
addition to services from the private sector, citizens continually create new grassroots 
initiatives. Governments and service providers can read these signals to understand the 
underlying needs and motivations, and step in to help – whether with regulation or services. 


Even if the motions are not carried through, policy-makers would gain insights from the 
discussion. 

This physical space could allow for many interactions, for example: 

. Co-creation – Conduct workshops where citizens from various target demographics 
join service providers in creating an idea to solve a problem 
. Concept validation – Conduct user studies with concept sketches and word 
documents to learn early how citizens feel about the proposed solution 
. Usability - Conduct user studies with early prototypes or sketches showing the 
mechanisms for a solution to understand how usable the solution is for different 
types of users 
. Feature requests – Enable citizens to request new solutions, with voting and 
curatorial mechanisms to identify the most requested ‘features’ 


Preconditions, e.g. on entities carrying out the action 

Pre-conditions for success include: 

. Engagement of recognised leaders in this field, within cities academia and Industry 
. Covering the breadth and diversity of European cities 
. Involving the key con/prosumers of services in cities: citizens, businesses, visitors 


 


4.2.4 Potential Action 4: City Visualisation 

Context 

The old adage “a picture paints a thousand words” has great relevance in the city context. The 
complexity of city systems can be daunting to understand for city engineers, let alone the general 
public. And as such few of the general public engage in understanding much about how their city 
develops or operates. Yet, place them in front of google earth and the situation changes; they are 
drawn in to explore. 

The ability to present layered information on city systems in an intuitive fashion using modern 
technologies is quickly developing. We already see 2D mobile apps with mapping and selective 
information becoming common place for search (and other) functions. 

Prospectively, such technologies can also be used to engage city residents for other more value-
adding purposes including urban planning, urban mobility, public security, environmental 
management, energy (and other resource) usage, waste management and the like. 

Also, the availability at the city level of numerous amounts and sources of data in combination with 
the possibility of plotting these data on various geographical levels (from street-level up to city level 
or even regional levels) provides policymakers, entrepreneurs and citizens with a rich source of 
information. It can be used for supporting innovation and policy-making as well as inform preventive 
action. For example, in a number of Dutch cities an “early warning system” is developed which 
predicts in which neighbourhoods preventive action should be taken on, for example, issues of 
maintaining city infrastructure and services. 

Goal 

The goal is to increase the pace by which European cities and companies exploit emerging 
visualisation technologies. This should help improve quality of life in cities, create concrete socio-
economic outcomes and help European companies to take a leading position in the new smart city 
visualisation market. 

Deliverable 

Deliverables include: 

i. ’State of the Art’ landscape 
o Technology Evolution: capturing technical developments and enabling actions (eg 
funded research initiatives) over the past decade, and forecast developments over 
upcoming years and put together a roadmap for action; 
o City Practices: map practices in European cities, and importantly also in leading cities 
worldwide, to provide a structured and categorised capture of the various ways that 
visualisation is being used in cities to improve outcomes (e.g. democratic, service, 
resilience). 




These actions can provide the essential fact base to support forward-planning at city level. 
Such a state-of-the-art assessment should be executed as a short-sharp exercise to develop 
an ‘appreciation’ of matters, rather than detailed complete research. 

Target delivery: start + 4 months 

ii. Proof of Concept (PoC) Initiatives 


Building on existing leading practices in European cities, cities and their partners can develop 
a number of scale PoCs that can demonstrate the value of visualisation in a number of areas. 
Each of these should involve a number of cities, with supporting industry / academic 
partners. PoCs could be set up to explore the priority usage categories identified through the 
above landscaping. 


Target delivery: start + 12-18 months 

iii. EU Industry / Capability Development 


Developing capacities among cities and companies in this fast developing field as part of the 
PoCs is a key concern. These can be exploited in Europe and beyond. In parallel with the 
development of the PoCs, steps could be established to further strengthen frameworks for 
action to support competitiveness (eg through European CEN standards; accessing 
Innovation funds; Skills building; etc) and to identify opportunities early on. 

Target delivery: (i) Implementation Plan: start + 12 months; (ii) Execution of Plan: start + 
12mos / ongoing. 

Short timelines should be set to rapidly deliver ‘beta’ products, recognising the dynamic 
development of technologies. 

Such initiatives will clearly have strong parallels with other initiatives in areas of urban mobility and 
energy that will be led by and benefit from the use of visualisation techniques. As such the overlaps 
and synergies between citizen focus led, and energy/mobility led initiatives warrant management. 

Preconditions, e.g. on entities carrying out the action 

Principal preconditions include: 

. Active participation of leading cities involved in this field 
. Commitment of leading academics in this field 
. Open collaboration between EU industry players (to support e.g. standardisation on a 
European level that will positively influence worldwide standards to the benefit of European 
companies) 
. An agile mentality and approach to execution – rapid beta development and testing 
. Benchmarking and tracking of worldwide leading practices to ensure ongoing EU 
competitiveness 


 Methods and details of implementation (how) 

An outline phasing of work could include: 

. Phase 1: Consortium of cities and industry established 
. Phase 2: Technical implementation 


Monitoring 

Clear indicators will need to be developed, following monitoring priorities such as: 

. How Europe can advance faster relative to other countries / regions? 
. The evolution of visualisation approaches and technologies within each usage theme? 


 


5 Priority Area 'Policy and Regulation' 

5.1 Introduction 

Innovative forms of smart city policies and regulations are needed to enable large scale 
implementation and roll-out of smart cities. Cities need an adequate set of framework conditions in 
the field of policy and regulations in order to be able to smarten up. New governance concepts are 
required to coordinate and integrate smart city stakeholders – cities, businesses, and research 
organisations – within the change process so to identify strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and 
threats. Stakeholders need to jointly experience and learn with new forms of governance and policy 
concepts to further the process of becoming a sustainable, smart city. 

5.2 Potential Actions 

Examples of actions that could help create and shape an enabling policy and regulatory framework 
are presented in the table below. 

Nr 

Title 

Summary of relevance 

Link to SIP actions 

1 

Smart City Strategy 
and implementation 
plan 

Strategic vision backed by all stakeholders and 
supported by long-term policies and respective 
regulatory frameworks as the basis for an effective 
and efficient implementation process 

# 1: Smart city 
strategy 

2 

Innovation zones 

Create the spaces in cities to test and evaluate the 
effect of new innovation models, revised policies 
and regulations, as well as consider different or 
reduced forms of regulation, where feasible. 

# 3: Innovation 
Zones 

3 

Innovative funding 
models 

Intelligent combination of funding instruments and 
funding commitments will enable to bypass any 
credit crunch and better plan project-bundles / 
infrastructure investments 

#2: innovative 
funding models 

Also links to SIP area 
nr. 8 Finance and 
Business models 

4 

Gap analysis 

Targeted analysis of fostering and hampering 
factors of national and EU policy frameworks for 
smart cities development and providing solutions 
how vertical interactions of policy fields can 
contribute to smart cities development 

# 1 & 2 

Also links to SIP area 
5 (Integrated 
Management and 
Planning) 

5 

Smart city networks 

Bringing together stakeholders on different aspects 
of smart cities (i.e. energy, ICT, transport) will 
generate new ideas and wider buy-in 

#1 Smart Strategy 

Links to SIP actions 4 
(citizen focus), and 6 
(knowledge-sharing) 

6 

Fitness checks 

Systematic evaluation of which parts of the existing 
regulatory/policy framework foster or hamper 
innovation for SCC and would need adequate 
action, either at EU, national or regional level 
(depending on competency). 

Also links to SIP area 
5 (Integrated 
Management and 
Planning) 

7 

Improving regulatory 
processes 

Developing an approach how new and/or unified 
regulations (legal, financial, etc.) can be introduced 
for cities in a better way, including clear targets 

# 1 (Smart city 
strategy) and 3 
(Innovation Zones) 




8 

Streamlining 
regulation 

Developing new approaches to create incentives 
for European cities to align specific policy 
regulations and technical standards 

# 1 (Smart city 
strategy) and #3 
(Innovation Zones) 



 

 


5.2.1 Potential Action 1: Developing a Smart City Strategy and Implementation plan 

Context 

Cities often focus on stand-alone smart cities projects. But experience shows that a strategic vision, 
backed by all stakeholders and supported by long-term policies and respective regulatory 
frameworks, is the basis for an effective and efficient change process. A detailed city- or even 
nation-wide implementation plan including intelligent and innovative funding models is key for a 
coordinated approach. Alignment, both horizontally (between different policy fields) and vertically 
(between regional, national, EU actors), using a participatory approach, guarantees a holistic view 
and commitment to the smart-city process. Cities need to involve a broad range of policy fields and 
stakeholders and formulate an integrated smart city strategy. With clearly defined targets in mind 
(e.g. establishment of energy- and carbon-neutral districts), cities, regional/national authorities, and 
EU lawmakers need to work together, asking themselves: what measures are required, what future 
research is needed, what political, administrative, technological and financial hurdles have to be 
eliminated, what regulations have to be put in place, or changed, in order to reach the goal? City 
authorities need to create frameworks for the deployment of integrated technologies, which allow 
for public-private partnerships between cities and industry, and the creation of innovative and stable 
business cases. 

On the other hand, private companies are hesitant to invest in new technologies and infrastructure 
due to policy uncertainty. For instance, major stakeholders in a smart city implementation actions 
(e.g. energy utilities) face uncertainty in long-term investments in energy infrastructure as long as 
policy uncertainty regarding e.g. fossil fuels, carbon prices or feed-in tariffs prevails. A smart city 
strategy will need to account for these political, but also financial, uncertainties and present a 
suitable approach towards dealing with them. The need for long-term policies with clear targets, 
actions and strategic guidelines on EU, national, regional and city level will need to be addressed to 
enable private investors to support a Europe-wide deployment of smart city concepts. While most of 
this is not within the competency of cities, cities needs to highlight the needs for effective policy 
frames at all levels to avoid being locked-in to energy-inefficient / carbon intensive / fossil fuel based 
technologies and developments, which will be difficult and costly to change at later point. 

Goal 

The goal is to increase the number of cities with a long-term smart city strategy and stakeholder 
involvement, thus ensuring a stable environment, i.e. regulations and policies for industry, utilities, 
etc. 

Deliverables 

i. Self-commitment of cities to a holistic approach (e.g. a smart city strategy, a climate or 
energy vision etc.) derived for instance from a stakeholder process to ensure full 
engagement and commitment. Such a strategy should link to the priorities and actions of the 
Strategic Implementation Plan (SIP) of our Partnership. A possible process should define a 
vision as well as a roadmap and a concrete action and funding plan to reach the goal. 
ii. Definition of barriers on European, national and regional level (regulations, policies, etc.) in 
the way of a smart city concept. Such barriers should be agreed upon by cities, industry and 
other relevant stakeholders and their removal be an essential part of the strategy process. 
iii. While the circumstances in cities can be substantially different so that different smart city 
strategies will have to be adopted, cities should make their strategy available (e.g. on a 
platform) to ensure learning and the adoption of best practices. 


Preconditions 

Such initiatives require input from a number of actors. The principal ones being: 


. City/Local Authorities: The smart city strategy has to be included in funding considerations. 
Also, cities have to self-commit to include individual smart city projects within the larger 
overall smart city strategy. 
. Regional Authorities: Regional authorities are responsible for Structural Funds in many 
countries. The integration of regional authorities could mobilise Structural Funds for smart 
city implementation actions. 
. Funding Organisations: When granting funds the wider strategy should be considered. 
. Private companies and public utilities: Their views should shape the smart city strategy. 
Incentives for private companies should be discussed to actively contribute and invest in the 
implementation of the strategy. 
. Research Organisations: Their views should shape the smart city strategy. Incentives for 
research organisations should be discussed to actively contribute and invest in the 
implementation of the strategy. 
. National Ministries: They should actively be aware and support their cities to work on a 
smart city strategy. 
. Citizens and NGOs: They should be informed about as well as actively included in the 
process. 


Methods and details of implementation 

An outline phasing of work could include: 

. Phase 1: Vision 
o Understanding of global and regional trends 
o Setting a Smart City Vision 


. Phase 2: Smart City Strategy and Roadmap 
o Deriving qualitative and quantitative targets 
o Definition of technological and non-technological measures 
o Scenario calculation and comparison with business-as-usual scenario 
o Establishing a monitoring and strategic intelligence system allowing for policy 
learning to support a long-term transition process 


. Phase 3: Action/Implementation plan and Funding plan 
o Definition of concrete actions (short, medium, long-term) for implementation 
o Perform Impact Assessment for planned activities 
o Development of funding plan 
o Preparation of demonstration projects 


. Phase 4: Dissemination and progress reports 
o Making strategy and roadmap available on a national and European level 
o Tracking of progress based on pre-defined milestones 


. Phase 5: Sustainable Smart City Development and Urban learning 
o Commitment of Member States develop partnerships between the smart city front 
runners and their followers or ‘emerging’ smart cities 
o Development of national frameworks for continuous smart city roll-out initiatives 




Monitoring 

Cities committing to a Smart City strategy should make relevant information publicly available (e.g. 
on a platform). Progress should be monitored and published as well clearly referring to pre-defined 
milestones (key performance indicators). Early adopters can thus serve as example to other cities 
facing similar challenges and conditions. 


5.2.2 Potential Action 2: Establishing Innovation Zones within cities 

Context 

Smart concepts require in many cases new and innovative technologies and concepts. Research and 
development is vital but at the same time cost-intensive and risky for private companies. It is 
therefore necessary to use all available instruments (e.g. innovative procurement, policies, state aid, 
and competition law) in order to incentivise companies to invest in innovation. Especially, a clear 
framework for PPPs should be established and bureaucratic hurdles reduced, thus increasing a city’s 
attractiveness for new businesses. Since innovation refers to the technological standard in place, 
policies might have to differ from country to country. 

At the same times, regulations or subsidies, as well as organisational and administrative 
arrangements, can also hinder innovation (e.g. feed-in tariffs or procurement practices can favour 
certain technology innovation and prevent other innovation from taking place). As a first step, an 
overall “fitness-check” should be conducted, identifying those parts of the policy framework that are 
promoting innovation and those parts of the policy framework that are hampering innovation. 
Innovation Zones can be used as testing ground for new and adapted regulations in a real 
environments, to the extent possible. This potential need for change has to be pointed out at EU, 
national and city level. Addressing these hurdles would allow new business models, e.g. building on 
active collaboration between municipalities and private investors or overcoming the gap between 
those investing and those benefitting from innovative, energy-efficient, green technology (e.g. 
owner of a building is investing in retrofitting while the tenant is benefitting from the reduced 
energy expenditures). However, revision and adaption of regulations and policies might be a delicate 
matter and of unsure outcome. Innovation Zones would therefore be space-, time- and actor-
specific. 

Goal 

The goal is to create a testing environment that allows and supports innovative concepts, business 
models, etc. 

Deliverables 

i. Fitness-check: Definition of regulations and policies on European, national and regional level 
fostering or hindering smart city implementation actions. Such barriers should be agreed 
upon by cities, industry and other relevant stakeholders and their removal be an essential 
part of the strategy process. 
ii. Establishment of an innovation zone where one or more regulations are suspended or, 
alternatively, where new regulations are put in place. 
iii. Streamlining administrative processes to speed up delivery, i.e. one-stop shops. In the same 
line cities need to devote the sufficient administrative capacities to support these processes. 


Preconditions 

The principal conditions are: 

. National and European level: create related policy provisions on national / European level 
where national or European law is concerned in order to allow cities to install innovation 
zones 
. Cities dedicate certain areas to become innovation zone 
. Key stakeholders (public, private, civil society) collaborate and commit to follow common 
principles/ goals 



. Stakeholder engagement: Depending on the concept to be tested in an innovation zone, it 
can affect residents to a large extend. They have to be informed about as well as actively 
included in the process. 
. Research Organisations: They should be included in the concept phase and can contribute to 
monitoring and evaluation process. 


Methods and details of implementation 

An outline phasing of work could include: 

. Phase 1: Concept 
o Idea generation for new/altered/suspended regulations with all stakeholders 
o Development of strategic partnerships 


. Phase 2: Set-up of innovation zone and monitoring 
. Phase 3: Evaluation, dissemination of lessons learned 
. Phase 4: Roll out 


Monitoring 

As a first indicator, the number and size of newly installed innovation zones should increase. 
Ultimately, the goal of a test ground is to roll out successful concepts on a larger scale. This should 
be used as criterion for success. 

 

 


6 Priority Area 'Integrated Planning and Management' 

6.1 Introduction 

Integrated planning and management involves spatial, temporal and technical coordination of 
diverse policy areas and planning resources to achieve defined goals using specified (financial) 
instruments. Its success requires the comprehensive and early involvement of all governmental and 
non-governmental players, private sector, and citizens. It is particularly challenging as it involves 
managing long-term planning perspectives and short term actions, addressing domains as diverse as 
transport, energy, ICT and beyond – in both existing (retrofit) and new urban territory. Our current 
approaches are insufficiently agile to cope with a more entrepreneurial approach and to respond to 
the pace of change in demography, societal expectations, and technology. This requires technical 
planning capabilities, more inclusive participatory and consultation processes, and greater 
collaboration within and across traditional policy and administrative boundaries within and between 
cities and communities. 

The need to deal with integrated planning and management in the context of Smart Cities is obvious 
for the following reasons: 

. It supports cities in their change from business-as-usual to low-carbon strategies and allows 
them to set more ambitious targets. This approach facilitates the using of methodologies to 
set up strategic and long-term vision for the city, the foreseeing of financing, the planning, 
the cooperation of multiple actors, while taking into account the local/regional/national 
environment. 
. This kind of approach will foster implementation of local policies leading to innovative smart 
integrated solutions for mobility, energy, water, waste management and buildings on the 
district to city level which support entrepreneurial and sustainability ambitions for the 
utility/mobility and other sectors. 
. Cities are continuously aiming at reducing the amount of energy required per unit of output, 
both at the level of collective city services and individual users. The integrated approach to 
energy and resource systems and infrastructure will play a part in increasing the energy 
efficiency of cities, along with the increased use of data and ICT integration. 
. Integrated planning improves potential diffusion of smart technologies. ICT-technology can 
help in structuring planning and management of smart city initiatives and enable more 
transparent, efficient resource use and implementation. Data can be used to enable 
resource integration across City systems, by helping to identify potential value at stake and 
the players involved. 
. The integrated planning and management helps to better identify promoters, drivers and 
barriers for Smart Cities developments and the means to change and handle the stakeholder 
interests. It reinforces the pro-active collaboration among different local actors. Cities and 
private sector need to have an understanding of city systems, including socio-economic 
aspects, to successfully develop Smart City solutions and enabling long-term objectives and 
commitment to secure funding. 


 


6.2 Potential Actions 

A number of initiatives are recommended to accelerate and demonstrate a better approach. The 
table below provides an overview and identifies links to action areas mentioned in the SIP, though it 
is by no means exclusive or exhaustive. 

# 

Title 

Summary 

Link to SIP actions 

1 

Smart Planning 
Forum 

(see exemplar) 

Focus on the necessary governance mechanisms 
enabling an holistic planning approach and to 
make this tangible and perceivable for all relevant 
stakeholders and citizens 

Improving collaborative 
governance mechanisms 
dedicated to integrated 
planning and management 

2 

Big Data for 
planning and 
management 

(see exemplar) 

Support the implementation of data driven 
planning and management approaches in 
developing and implementing smart city projects 

Maximising the use of city-
wide data 

3 

Urban Simulation 
and Planning 

(see exemplar) 

Urban simulation and planning models to capture 
the dynamics and impacts of urban development 
and policies 

Using urban simulation 
and planning models 

4 

Smart Energy Map 

Demonstrate agile energy maps capturing direct 
and indirect production and consumption of 
energy over sectors 

Focussing on the use of 
energy-models and 
energy-mapping 

5 

City communication 
and engagement 

Demonstration of innovative peer-to-peer and 
citizen-to-government-platforms for exchange of 
ideas and opinions regarding city planning and 
management issues 

Using visualization, 
decision support and peer-
to-peer-tools 




6.2.1 Potential Action 1: Smart Planning Forum 

Context 

The SIP stresses the importance of having planning and management approaches at the city-level 
which are agile enough to respond to the needs of various stakeholders and holistic enough to 
capture synergistic benefits across silo’s. This action intends to focus on the necessary governance 
mechanisms enabling a holistic planning approach and to make this tangible and perceivable for all 
relevant stakeholders and citizens. Securing long-term commitment from stakeholders and balancing 
long-term objectives with short-term actions is a key challenge when implementing smart city 
initiatives. Key needs in this context include the need for defining long-term goals, and stimulating 
and managing the dynamics of entrepreneurship in smart city initiatives involving public partners, 
private partners and citizens. 

Goal 

The action will demonstrate experiences and results of best practices in cities across Europe 
regarding collaborative governance mechanisms dedicated to integrated planning and management. 
The end-goal is for cities to achieve improved efficiency in developing and implementing smart city 
initiatives. 

Deliverable 

i. Toolkit and shared experience in developing and implementing Integrated Action Plans at 
city level, including quantifiable contribution to energy efficiency and climate goals with a 
sound business plan. 
ii. Demonstrated involvement of private sector and citizens in planning Smart City-initiatives 
through communication and sharing of plans and results of projects, viz. web-based or 
through social media. 


Preconditions 

Preconditions for various entities include: 

. Private sector, in particular financial institutions, to develop new financial arrangements 
which support entrepreneurial ways of implementing smart city projects 
. City authorities supporting innovative governance and planning of public space. They are 
also important in enabling public services to cooperate across their respective silos in 
developing common implementation plans which provide long-term political commitment. 
. Public services to collaborate on a common implementation of smart city policy objectives. 
. Companies are to be expected to cooperate on developing public-private partnerships. 


Methods and details of implementation 

A possible implementation approach could include: 

. Phase 1: Survey and collection of best practices on integrated planning and management 
. Phase 2: Conceptualisation and definition of common framework for integrated planning 
and management for Smart Cities 
. Phase 3: Testing and demonstrating 


Monitoring 

To monitor progress, attention can be paid to the following set of indicators: 

. Number of cities having adopted Smart City plans including medium-to-long term targets 
involving all relevant departments and public services. 
. Share of Public-Private partnerships as Smart City initiatives 
. Share of citizen-driven initiatives as part of the Smart City planning cycle 


