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Smart cities should be constantly evolving. New cities will be built and existing ones will be retrofitted to create economic development and improve the lives of citizens, says Smart Cities Council. A smart city uses integrated planning and digital communication technologies to enhance quality, performance and interactivity of urban services, to reduce costs and resource consumption and to improve contact between citizens and government.

Although ideas vary as to which technologies are included under the smart city umbrella, generally, the smart city infrastructure is built on high-speed broadband with intelligent design for energy and water smart grids, virtual environments for health care and education, and intelligent systems for transportation and buildings with roadway sensors, with the goal being zero waste, zero carbon and sustainable transportation. No master design exists for a model smart city but there must be a collaborative effort from within and throughout all factions, especially with the cybersecurity needs of a modern city.

The Council's vision is a world where digital technology and intelligent design have been harnessed to create smart, sustainable cities with high-quality living and jobs. Cities must embody the Council's three core values: Livability—Cities that provide clean, healthy living conditions without pollution and congestion with a digital infrastructure that makes city services instantly and conveniently available. Workability—Cities that provide an energy and connectivity infrastructure, along with essential services, in order to compete for high-quality jobs on a global level. Sustainability—Cities that provide services without stealing from future generations.

The one constant in all of these discussions is a universal expectation of substantial growth. The Smart 2020 report claims the related technologies and industries will grow four-fold to become a $2.1-trillion market by 2020. Indeed, cities and companies are embracing these concepts in record numbers.

One such city initiative focuses on energy consumption, along with air, water and waste. Charlotte, NC started a voluntary partnership called Envision Charlotte to reduce energy use and operating costs in commercial buildings. Real estate owners including city government used intelligent-building technologies and existing city infrastructure to create a dashboard to display real-time data. The goal was to reduce energy use in the city's core by 20% during a five-year space. Four years into the project, Envision Charlotte is well on its way to achieving that goal.

While Envision is less than five years old, the concept is catching on across the country. Last fall, the US Department of Energy announced a “Smart Cities” initiative, allocating more than $160 million in federal funding to be invested in new technology collaborations to help communities address issues related to resource availability, sustainability and infrastructure. Stepping up to this call to action is Envision America, a nonprofit whose aim is to encourage cities to meet the challenge of sustainability by developing innovative technologies that tackle energy, water, waste and air quality issues, i.e. to help America's cities become smarter.

Envision America hosted its inaugural workshop last month in Charlotte, NC during which 10 selected cities, as well as industry and academic experts, met to develop smart solutions to challenges faced by cities. The selected locations included Pittsburgh; Los Angeles; San Diego; Milwaukee; Portland, OR; Dallas; Cambridge, MA; Spokane, WA; New York City; and Greenville, SC.

With projects ranging from automated transportation solutions offering commuters innovative alternatives to a standard system for collecting, analyzing and communicating city-specific sustainability data, each of the cities involved is working toward improvements that will increase connectivity. The selected cities will receive technical assistance throughout the year to implement plans with guidance from experts whose scope of work aligns with projects. Additionally, selected cities will receive benefits from Envision America partners including GE, which will provide smart city infrastructure counsel and expertise, as well as one year of free access to GE Predix, the cloud-based platform for the Industrial Internet; and Microsoft, which will provide one year of access to the Microsoft Azure Government cloud platform.

Other initiatives such as the one introduced by AT&T last month, a smart cities framework, provide a holistic approach to help cities better meet citizens' needs. The framework, which will roll out in select spotlight cities and universities, is supported by an alliance of key technology leaders and industry organizations.

Along with those types of initiatives, new cities are joining longstanding tech capitals such as the San Francisco Bay Area to get on board in embarking on similar economic development and urban planning initiatives related to infrastructure, employment-center locations, transit centers, affordable housing and high-speed Internet access.

Denver has positioned itself as one of the most innovative cities in the United States even before winning Super Bowl 50. On the real estate side, the city has made measured and significant strides during the past 10 years in the areas of transit, housing and mixed-use development. Adopting a growth framework, the region launched the FasTracks program, an ambitious plan with 121 miles of commuter and light-rail tracks, bus rapid transit and park-and-ride locations, connecting to the airport and major employment centers. Links to bike and walking trails, parks and rivers are also planned.

Whereas Denver has been on various top 10 lists ranking quality of life and best business climate for quite some time, Kansas City managed to shake its flyover-city status when it became the first in the country to receive Google Fiber access in 2011. Fiber's unparalleled speed (100 times faster than the average connection) earned the city a ranking of 15th in the Metropolitan Tech–STEM Growth Index. Google Fiber is now available in Austin, TX; Charlotte, NC; Nashville; Provo, UT; Raleigh-Durham, NC; Salt Lake City; and San Antonio.

A series of initiatives are intended to capitalize on this momentum, including leveraging partnerships, says ULI. Cisco is supporting Kansas City's 2.2-mile streetcar line by offering free public Wi-Fi, community information kiosks and a data-driven lab to support innovation, while Kansas City Power and Light plans to build 1,000 electric-vehicle charging stations.

Though a city with only about 170,000 residents, Chattanooga, TN thinks like a smart city: it's the only one in the country to offer one gigabit-per-second Internet speed—the equivalent of Google Fiber speed—not just to “fiberhoods” but to every home and business in the community through a public utility. Beyond Internet access, this fiber-optic network also runs Chattanooga's smart grid, allowing the city's electricity distribution system—system components, utility employees and customers—to communicate with one another in real time, creating a more resilient, sophisticated power grid where a $1-billion company such as Amazon can thrive. Chattanooga secured a distribution facility for the tech giant in 2010, creating an estimated 1,425 new jobs for the area.

While Denver, Kansas City and Chattanooga represent the next generation of tech-oriented cities, other communities are finding ways to attract and accommodate tech firms as a way to reposition economies and, by extension, evolve into smart cities. Some of the examples include collaborations with developers to create mixed-use transit centers using the latest technology and sustainability.

Stuart Cowan, chief scientist with Smart Cities Council, tells Real Estate Forum: “By integrating smart cities solutions ranging from building management systems to shared vehicle fleets, real estate developers can enhance the marketability and profitability of projects while providing environment benefits and a richer experience for residents and tenants.”

An example of a Denver project, Highlands' Garden Village is a mixed-use, transit-oriented development on the site of a former amusement park, in what was a transitional neighborhood. The community's range of housing types and price points demonstrate that smaller, infill sites can enhance economic and social viability. The combination of residential, office, arts, entertainment and retail allows residents to live, work and shop within a few minutes' walk of each other. The single-family homes exceed Colorado's Built Green and EnergyStar programs requirements. All of the buildings incorporate recycled materials, LOW-VOC products and energy-efficient windows, and are powered with alternative energy sources. The landscaping consists of water-conserving native plants and many of the site's existing trees were retained.

Indigo at Twelve | West extends the success of the Brewery Blocks across West Burnside in Portland, OR, acting as a connector between the West End neighborhood and the pedestrian-friendly Pearl District. This brings more people into this portion of the city's core, stimulating economic and cultural development. To make this mixed-use building a reality, Gerding Edlen needed to attract other commercial development to the area. Because ZGF Architects needed a new headquarters to accommodate its growing workforce, its new office was combined with market-rate apartments and ground-floor retail. The LEED Platinum, 22-story building, with 17 floors of urban homes, four floors of office space and five floors of underground parking, is the first of its kind in the Pacific Northwest. It has four roof-mounted wind turbines supplying renewable energy to the building, a 32-panel solar water system, passive heating and cooling in the office space, renewable bamboo floors, cabinets and wool carpets, and connection to the Brewery Blocks' chilled water plant. Moreover, rainwater is harvested and reused and an eco-roof helps to mitigate storm-water runoff.

Some of the elements mentioned in the Portland project are at the forefront of net-zero construction, a hallmark of smart cities. A further example is DPR Construction's regional office in San Francisco. Producing more energy than it consumes, it is the first commercial office in that city to achieve net-zero certification to date. By being both the owner and contractor for the renovation project, DPR was able to push the limits on its sustainability goals for the 24,010-square-foot building and create a true living lab of sustainable business practices. In nearby San Ramon, CA, the Bishop Ranch development has updated all of its 27 buildings to earn LEED status, the largest concentration of LEED-certified buildings outside an urban area. The development has also incorporated water-saving measures to its mixed-use City Center project to reduce usage in 2015 by approximately 22.5%, or 8.5 million gallons, from the previous year.

“We've been mindful of water usage and saving at Bishop Ranch for years, and especially in our planning for City Center. We're excited about the extensions of reclaimed water that will serve this project as well,” said Alexander Mehran Jr., president and COO of Sunset Development Co. “Additionally, Bishop Ranch will be the project pilot location for two self-driving shuttles from EasyMile, arriving this summer.”

In 2005, Federal Realty Investment Trust took on a challenge in Somerville, MA that others turned away from numerous times. The firm transformed one of the state's largest brownfield sites and revitalized it into a neighborhood, Assembly Row. The 40-acre, $1.2-billion mixed-use project, less than two miles from Downtown Boston, is the culmination of a visioning and community input process, transforming an environmentally compromised site into a thriving centerpiece and gathering place for Somerville residents.

“Our goal at Federal Realty is to create authentic, mixed-use smart-growth neighborhoods that are connected to their surrounding fabric, often transit-oriented, but always responsive to the unique opportunities created by their markets. We know that business thrives where people thrive, and we endeavor to create the exact right environment to do just that,” says Don Briggs, EVP of development at FRIT. “At Assembly Row, we came together with leaders in the city, the Commonwealth and the community to build a new neighborhood that embraces the unique qualities of Somerville, connects to Boston and delivers an amenity-rich environment for the workers, residents and surrounding community.”

Phase 1 is to include low-rise office buildings, while Phase 2 calls for mid- and high-rise office and residential. Now about one-third complete with the second phase underway, Assembly Row has the first new MBTA Orange line transit station in 25 years, Somerville's first LEED Gold office building, dozens of shops and restaurants, hundreds of residents, a waterfront park and a 100,000-square-foot office building. Anchor tenant Partners Healthcare will occupy its 700,000-square-foot headquarters this year.

When these smart developments are combined with smart cities that are fully implemented across the board, the cities will provide live status updates on traffic patterns, air quality, parking spaces, water, power and light. That type of inner-connected information will improve the economic and environmental health of cities for owners, residents, merchants and visitors alike.

This is an HTML version of an article that ran in Real Estate Forum. To see the story in its original format, click here.

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