Page 398 - Shaping smarter and more sustainable cities - Striving for sustainable development goals

1 Introduction

New cities are being planned in some countries where there is rapid growth in industrialisation. This
leads populations to migrate from a rural to an urban environment to seek higher paid employment.
This trend is expected to continue at least to year 2050. City planners therefore have the task of
planning a city with a 'clean sheet of paper'. It is intended that this document will also be applicable
to for suburban or city expansion which is being planned on a clean slate.

Until now city infrastructure, including ICT, has evolved to meet the needs of 'organic growth'
whereby villages grew into towns and then into cities as populations have grown. Each new building
or group of buildings was planned at a different time.
This document focuses on answering the question, "How should ICT infrastructure be planned for a
new city given that it has to be both 'smart' and 'sustainable'?". The ICT infrastructure can then be
planned and a set of technical requirements can be drawn up. After that, relevant specifications can
be written, drawing upon the wealth of existing ICT specifications and standards.
The approach taken assumes that the city or development area of an existing city is to be built from
new with no existing structures above or below ground. A feature which is new for smart sustainable
cities (SSCs) is the need for a sensor layer network and peripheral devices which may be directly
connected to the internet, i.e., the internet of things (IoT).

Sensors may be connected directly to a source of power and transmission such as an electricity cable
or metallic pair. Sensors which require high bandwidth could be connected by optical fibre and wire
for electricity. Sensors which use radio communication would need a source of power such as
batteries.

Building and maintaining telecommunications and sensor layer networks is expensive, especially
when installed on a reactive basis to meet emerging demand. To reduce costs, this document
explores the opportunities for infrastructure sharing from the outset. The infrastructure could focus
on a central location, such as the main railway station, city centre, or multiple clusters forming a
city, where high capacity services are radiate towards the periphery of the city where individual
homes, people, places and things require services. Shared infrastructure can save significant costs,
especially when provision is made for maintenance, upgrade and growth over the lifecycle.

The primary concern for all types of installation is safety.

2 Scope

These Technical Specifications describe the various infrastructures for a smart sustainable city in a
new‐development area.

The designated infrastructure in this document includes: common physical infrastructure
highlighting ICT, ducted and trenched infrastructure below ground, over ground common physical
infrastructure, common risers in buildings, etc. The following issues are considered: safety,
maintenance, lifecycle including possible obsolescence, flexibility points, scalability and growth.
Examples are included of best practices for physical infrastructure including opportunities for
sharing service paths below and above ground, such as conduits.
NOTE – Sharing wireless service infrastructure, such as lampposts and masts is mentioned in the FG‐SSC
report "EMF Considerations in Smart Sustainable Cities" [b‐24].

388 ITU‐T's Technical Reports and Specifications