The influence of context in the implementation of a smart city project: the case of Cidade Inteligente Búzios

Mariana Brandão,Luiz Antonio Joia

doi:10.1590/0034-761220170133

Abstract

Abstract The growth of urban population is widely acknowledged to be a central trend that poses challenges for the administration of cities worldwide. In this context, several advances in information and communication technologies (ICTs) have been developed to gradually transform urban centers into smart cities. In this article, we seek to contribute to filling a knowledge gap in the literature on smart city - namely the lack of empirical data in works on this subject - by investigating a project aimed at turning the municipality of Búzios in Brazil into a smart city, named Cidade Inteligente Búzios (CIB). Our objective is, thus, to describe and understand the controversial influence of the context in the implementation of the project, which was considered a success for some actors and irrelevant for others, a situation that defies the very concept of success in the implementation of smart cities.

Highlights

In recent decades, the general trend in the world has been the increasing concentration of the population in urban areas of both developed and developing countries
It is worth mentioning that ANEEL have not yet issued a final verdict about the Cidade Inteligente Búzios (CIB) project, Ampla and the researchers involved in the project were certain that the agency would accept the investments made, as we can see in the deposition of I9 and I10, respectively: “Ampla is sure that Aneel will accept our investments as the project has brought several benefits for the city’s population” (Q22); “We have developed state-of-art research in this project
We developed this study to understand the role of context in the deployment of smart city initiatives

Summary

Introduction

The general trend in the world has been the increasing concentration of the population in urban areas of both developed and developing countries. From 2007 onwards, the global urban population have started to exceed the global rural population with an everincreasing growth of people living in cities worldwide (United Nations, 2015) In this way, the United Nations (2015) expects that by 2050 nearly 70 per cent of the total population will be living in urban areas. The rapid and unplanned urban growth poses significant threats to the sustainable development of cities and challenges their administrations to ensure their livable conditions (Chourabi et al, 2012). In this context, several advances in information and communication technologies (ICT) have been proposed in order to alleviate such strain and transform urban centers into smart cities (Sarkar, 2015). Smart city initiatives will lead to more efficient and cost-effective solutions to urban problems, ranging from mobility, energy use, CO2 emissions and resource use efficiency (March and Ribera-Fumaz, 2016)

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Conclusion