Abstract
Purpose: The Smart Cities due to their important role in infrastructure building activities and offering smart services to their residents in living an enjoyable life are always in the limelight and discussions. The current COVID-19 pandemic has however changed the situation, and has forced us to rethink the way we operate, carry out day to day activities and services. COVID-19 pandemic has changed the normal routine life to a significant extent, damaged the economies of many countries, shifted our business priorities, and so on. In such situations, how can Smart Cities remain unaffected due to COVID-19? This paper has analysed and discussed in detail the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on Smart Cities operations and development and also, how this impact can be measured. It has described in detail how Smart Cities has changed their priorities and how they are more focusing on building Smart Healthcare facilities, Smart Isolation Wards, Smart Medicare facilities, services related to Telemedicine, Virtual Doctor, dedicated COVID-19 Command and Control Centres and so on. The paper has also highlighted the post COVID-19 Pandemic era for Smart Cities development and operations. Finally, the paper has concluded that Smart Cities development during and post COVID-19 Pandemic has witnessed a short obstacle in its growth journey, Smart Cities are definitely going to win the war against COVID-19 and will become Smarter in the future to tackle such pandemics. Design/Methodology/Approach: This research paper made use of available secondary data in research journal papers, online books, white papers, and dedicated websites on the research subject area to analyze the impact of COVID-19 Pandemic on Smart Cities Development and Operations. Findings/Result: Due to COVID-19 Pandemic, it is observed that many sectors growth slow down due to budget cut and financial constraints, however, certain sectors such as Medical Infrastructure, Insurance, and eCommerce have seen booms, this has made Smart Cities to have a strong focus on certain Smart Services related to Medical facilities, IT infrastructure to facilitate contactless transactions, Telemedicine Service, Smart Isolation Wards, etc. whereas services with respect to entertainment parks, tourism, etc. slowed down due to less priority and budget constraints. Originality/Value: Based on the available secondary data, this research has identified the impact of COVID-19 on ongoing Smart Cities development and also how its priorities and focus got shifted to build up certain services and infrastructure. The paper has also highlighted post COVID-19, how Smart Cities development, operations, and maintenance activities will be affected. Paper Type: Secondary data-based Research
Highlights
The COVID-19 pandemic left unprecedented impacts on individuals and on the major segments of societies including industries, education, business and trades, governments, environments and almost all the activities of the mankind as a whole
It is observed that not many research papers are available on this subject and we mainly focused on study of white papers, conference papers, online books, blogs, and dedicated websites for tackling COVID-19 pandemic and Smart Cities
The COVID-19 pandemic has changed the day to day activities and the way we were living our life so far to a significant extent
Summary
The COVID-19 pandemic left unprecedented impacts on individuals and on the major segments of societies including industries, education, business and trades, governments, environments and almost all the activities of the mankind as a whole. In the beginning of January 2020, no one had any idea that a small outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, capital of Hubei Province of China, which was initially considered as China specific outbreak, will go and spread widely to the whole world with in few months of time and will cause millions of people hospitalization and killings worldwide By this time, it is clear that this pandemic is not going to go away soon and with limited stock of reliable vaccine for COVID-19 as of mankind needs to prepare to stay with COVID-19 for longer duration. For other activities budget is either slashed or no more budget is available This has made other domains and industries greatly impacted but in COVID-19 phase, in reality, this has boosted development of Smart Cities with better medical infrastructure and facilities. Let us see in detail how Smart Cities are fighting against COVID -19
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