Information
Technology and Changing Communities:
Our cities of the future will be built along information highways
By John Eger, San Diego Union-Tribune, Wednesday, December
2, 1998
In the 20th century, our lifestyles have benefited greatly from advancements in air travel, a national highway system and the advent of the computer age.
Future community enhancements promise to integrate collaborative efforts in information technology to truly transform our communities. Unless these efforts are collaborative, however, only a fraction of our population will benefit from advancements in technology, and community growth will be stunted. For this reason, we have to change the manner in which we implement technology to truly transform our communities into "smart communities."
On Dec. 10 and 11, civic leaders will gather at the "Cities of the Future Conference" in San Francisco to address how information technology can transform communities to improve the quality of life of its citizens. Gov. Pete Wilson, San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown, Oakland Mayor (and former governor) Jerry Brown, state Public Utilities Commissioner Josiah Neeper and others will discuss how cities will take advantage of technical developments. Vice President Al Gore is scheduled to lead off the conference and address the audience via satellite television.
The discussion promises to include more than just information technology, but also how communities can prosper as a consequence of the vision and endeavors of local governments. The concept of the "city of the future" is a community in which the tools of telecommunications are fully deployed and information technology is used as a catalyst for major reform.
Our cities of the future will be built along information highways where a broadband system of communications connects every home, office, school, library and health care facility in the region. These communities will certainly be connected to the rest of the world via the World Wide Web as well.
These endeavors are creating "smart communities," a term increasingly used as cities, schools and health care providers continue to exploit information technology to benefit citizens, students and patients.
Benefits from a more technologically advanced information system among municipal governments include fax-on-demand building permits, updating your dog's license on line, telemedicine, where patients can modem their vital signs to their health care provider from home, and schools where students can perform on-line research, complete homework assignments or participate in classes over the Internet.
How will the public sector use this technology to improve our quality of life? It must partner with industry and nonprofit organizations to develop a coherent and compelling vision that makes it clear how the new information networks are going to promote job growth, economic development and improved quality of life with the community. The community must communicate the vision broadly.
Cities that are succeeding in creating "smart communities" possess a number of common features. One characteristic is collaboration among different sectors to include government, business, academia, nonprofit organizations and others. These collaboratives are becoming the new model for successful urban organization in the global age and the only local political arrangement likely to make it possible for municipalities to survive in the increasingly intense global competition that lies ahead.
Examples of smart community efforts exist throughout the United States. In cities such as San Diego, Seattle, Austin, Raleigh-Durham and even tiny Blacksburg, Va., instances of collaboration are in evidence.
In Blacksburg, home to Virginia Tech, town officials, university representatives and private industry partnered together several years ago to give the majority of Blacksburg citizens access to electronic mail and the World Wide Web. Through a cooperative with the schools and the library, all children received free electronic mail accounts and access to the Web.
We as citizens and community leaders must embrace the technological challenge and opportunity for a higher quality of life in our communities and encourage our political officials to build the "city of the future" now.