Connected Urban Development

Key Facts

• The Connected Urban Development (CUD) programme is a five-year initiative developed through Cisco's participation in the Clinton Global Initiative. The Programme is a partnership between CISCO and the cities of Amsterdam, San Francisco, Seoul, Birmingham, hamburg, Lisbon and Madrid.
• Traditional approaches to reducing carbon emissions have consisted of using less energy, other forms of energy, and capturing and storing carbon.   CUD  takes a different approach by changing how cities deliver services to residents, how residents work, how traffic flow is managed, how public transportation operates, and how real estate resources are used and managed.
  
  CUD aims to reduce global carbon emissions while simultaneously promoting economic development by fundamentally changing the way cities operate and use natural resources. CUD is a public-private partnership between Cisco and cities around the world that demonstrates how information and communication technology (ICT) and network connectivity can increase efficiencies and reduce
  carbon emissions in urban environments.  
  
  The CUD blueprint comprises a number of building blocks—work, mobility, buildings, energy, and sustainable socioeconomics.
  
  The partnership to date includes the cities of San Francisco, Amsterdam, Seoul, Birmingham, Hamburg, Lisbon and Madrid.  In addition research support is provided by MIT and the programme is coordinated by Cisco.
  
  The immediate focus of the programme is the implementation of several proof-of-concept pilots such as:
  

  • Personal Travel Assistant – allowing users to better coordinate and organise their travel needs
  • Smart Transportation pricing tools
  • Smart work center technology enabling remote working and telecommuting

  
  Broadly the CUD solution space includes:
  

  • Connected and sustainable work places
  • Connected and sustainable mobility solutions
  • Connected and sustainable Buildings
  • Connected and sustainable energy generation and management
  • Sustainable Socio-Economic models of business and citizen participation

  
  Each of the participating cities are contributing to the pilot programmes within CUD:
  

  • Amsterdam: Connected and sustainable work and living solutions
  • San Francisco: Smart mobility and eco-footprint monitoring
  • Seoul: Connected and sustainable mobility solutions
  • Birmingham: EnergyWise buildings and ICT
  • Hamburg: Intelligent traffic management
  • Lisbon: EnergyWise and UrbanEnergy for schools
  • Madrid: Community & home UrbanEnergy management

  
  Specific examples of these are covered in more detail in the CUD case studies included in this report or online.
  
  
• The project took 60 months to implement
• The actual (or likely) cost of the project is $15m commitment by Cisco to the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI). In addition the participating cities are contributing project funding and resources.
• The actual (or projected) savings from the project are
  Connected Bus pilot: Generates an additional 30hours/wk during which the bus is available.  This will directly result in the ability to carry an additional 3000 passengers per year ($2070 in additional revenue)
  
  Smart Work Centers have a direct impact on the amount of floor space required to service the needs of office works, and therefore a positive corresponding economic impact.  Existing models (based on the need to serve 100 employees) indicate that there would be a €13,856 gain per employee in terms of cash flow over a 10 year period. 
• The primary sponsor for the project was Cisco’s Chairman and CEO John Chambers as a commitment to the Clinton Global Initiative, and as a core contribution to Cisco’s corporate social responsibility activities

What was the impact?

• Did you use a specific methodology or third party to calculate CO2e or KWh savings?

  A number of internationally recognized methodologies, Cisco derived and third party calculations are applied.

• Notes about Carbon savings/calculations

  Detailed carbon, cost and energy savings are detailed in each of the CUD projects. More information at the CUD website.
  
• The project has independent verification for results

Making it Happen

• Barriers experienced during the initiation of the project

• Comments regarding barriers

  Inexperience between public/private institutions working together in partnership. Among other these challenges included the allocation of resource, funding and setting of direction.

• Other comments regarding barriers preventing the successful completion of the project

  1. Working with other companies in the public/private partnership model requires clear remit/scoping
  2. Challenges for governments co-developing with a private enterprises & related donation terms.

• How were they overcome?

  The implementation of a programme governance framework has ensured that most of the issues arising out of these barriers can be dealt with quickly.
  
  In addition Cisco has facilitated through providing access to collaboration technologies, technical and strategic guidance and support to ensure these barriers can be removed.
  
  

• What were the key lessons learnt?

  The key lessons learnt during this project to date include:
  

  • Placing a high value on private/public partnerships.  Cities able to forge these partnerships effectively have are abele to much more effectively launch projects and pilots
  • Where cities are not well versed in the forging of public/private partnerships, Cisco has provided the appropriate support – this has been a key contributor to success in these instances.
  • Placing milestones on the delivery of proofs of concept projects.  This ensures the appropriate level of focus between organizations.
  • Opening the up the initiative to public comment has proven crucial. This allows citizens to provide input into the process and brings a practical reality to the outcomes.