Smart Cities: Developing a Regional Framework

The U.S. Department of Transportation's (USDOT) Smart City Challenge was very effective at starting a national dialogue about how cities can leverage the inevitable boom in the Internet of Things (IoT) and advanced information technologies to address our transportation challenges. Although USDOT's challenge focused primarily on transportation, the "Smart City" also addresses other issues that impact the community such as climate change, healthcare, education, energy, water, wastewater, public safety, and inclusive infrastructure. Seventy-eight cities (including Tampa, FL, USA, where the author worked on the city's Smart City Challenge proposal) presented bold, innovative concepts including connected/autonomous vehicles, multimodal transportation apps, smart parking, automated transit bus platooning, fleet electrification, all kinds of sensors, and even high- tech gondolas. The City of Columbus, OH, USA ultimately won the challenge, but other cities are continuing their work to bring these proposals to fruition.