Issue 8

URBAN GATEWAYFor The International Urban Development Community

Photo: ChristianSchd/Wikimedia

March 2, 2015

BARCELONA: THE WORLD’S SMARTEST CITY

2

URBAN GATEWAY is an online community that helps cities and urban practitioners across the world unite to share knowledge and take action.

The Urban Gateway is the first web platform of its kind to leverage the energy and resources of the global urban development com-munity. It will allow UN-HABITAT and its external partners to network,exchange knowledge, discuss issues and share opportunities related to sustainable urbanization worldwide.

It responds to the needs of our partners - from governments and local authorities, to researchers, civil society organizations and the private sector - to establish a central hub of practical knowledge on building sustainable towns and cities.

Users of the Gateway are able to find and contact other members, form common interest groups, offer and apply for opportunities, share experiences and get the latest local and global news on urban issues in their language.

The Urban Gateway maintains the momentum, discussions and networks developed at the World Urban Forums, reinforces part-nerships and highlights the impact of World Urban Campaign.

We invite all partners to join the Gateway atwww.urbangateway.org

Welcome to the Urban Gateway

Follow us

Photo: UN Photo/Eskinder Debebe

Photo: Paul Goyette/Wikimedia

3

Preaching walkability but building sprawl

How walkable is Cairo?

Barcelona: The world’s smartest city

4

10

12

4 Photo: Oh-Barcelona.com/Wikimedia

Barcelona is dubbed the ‘world’s smartest city’

5

The Spanish city of Barcelona has been ranked the world’s smart-est city, beating off competitors, New York, London and Singapore, with Rio de Janeiro missing out on a top five position.

Compiled by Juniper Research, analysts in the mobile and digital tech-nology sector,Barcelona was given the top position following an analy-sis of 25 cities’ ‘smart’ capabilities, with particular focus on their use of electricity grids, traffic management and lighting, alongside aspects such as technological capability and social cohesion.

“The rankings are heavily influenced by our full research study, and as such, establishment of smart grid, traffic and street lighting initiatives were key metrics,” Steffen Sorrell, the report’s author and senior analyst, told Cities Today. “To that end, input was gathered from both secondary and primary sources.”

Barcelona won praise for implementing environmentally sustainable projects–an area in which New York and London fell behind but made up lost ground in their willingness to engage with citizens through open data.

“I don’t believe you can create a successful smart city without collabo-ration across all stakeholders,” added Sorrell, who also noted citizen engagement was an area that the South Korean city, Songdo, and Mas-dar in the United Arab Emirates, scored poorly. Rio de Janeiro equally surprised Sorrell for its absence in the top five rankings, considering the level of municipal agency cohesion, he said.

“However, the [Rio] Centre of Operations has not yet reached its poten-tial in terms of data analytics, while the huge reliance on video surveil-lance is a doubled-edged sword,” he warned.

The Juniper study finds that smart grid initiatives will achieve US$10.7 billion savings annually by 2019 through a combination of reduced en-ergy consumption and emissions reductions in smart cities.

The report found that despite substantial differences in energy market regulation and policy, there is a strong desire on a global scale to imple-ment a ‘smarter grid’. National energy concerns, caused by emissions reduction policies, transmission line loss and grid reliability are reasons, the study highlights, why cities need to move a ‘two-way’ grid.

“Issues such as grid cybersecurity and winning over the consumer where smart metering is concerned still need to be addressed,” added Sorrell. “Education is key–certainly in terms of stakeholder information sharing as well as promoting the full benefits of a smart grid beyond a vague notion of a reduction in energy bills.”

Posted by

6 Photo: DFID/Wikimedia

Kenya’s under-ground water may be too salty to drink

7

Tests on a vast aquifer found in Kenya's drought-wracked Turkana region show the water is too salty to drink, a government official said on Friday.

The 2013 discovery of underground lakes the size of the U.S. state of Delaware, according to satellite imagery, was hailed as a chance for the arid northern region to finally feed its peo-ple.

At the time of the discovery, Kenya's water minister said the "newly found wealth of water opens the door to a more prosperous future for the people of Turkana and the nation as a whole".

But the first test results from Lotikipi, the largest aquifer which is close to Kenya's border with South Sudan, have been disappointing.

"The water is not fit for human consumption," said Japheth Mutai, chief executive officer of the government-owned Rift Valley Water Services Board, which is responsible for providing water in the region.

The underground water would have to be desalinated -- an expensive and energy intensive process -- before it could be used for human consumption, livestock or irrigation, Mutai said.

The test well, drilled 350 metres underground, showed salt levels seven times higher than the safe limit allowed by the World Health Organization (WHO), he said.

"The numbers don't look good," Mutai told Thomson Reuters Foundation on Friday. "It is causing a lot of anxiety."

More than a third of Kenya's 41 million people have no access to clean water.

The country's north is particularly poor as droughts regularly decimate livestock which tradi-tional nomadic herders depend on for survival.

Currently one in four people in Turkana -- 135,500 people --require food assistance due to repeated poor rains and conflict, the World Food Programme's spokeswoman Challiss Mc-Donough said. Malnutrition rates are above the emergency level of 15 percent.

A stable water supply from the 250 billion cubic metres of water thought to be in Turkana's underground lakes could help mitigate these recurring hunger crises.

The government is "still holding out hope" that other wells in Lotikipi will find cleaner water, Mutai said, and more drilling is underway.

The U.N.'s scientific and cultural agency, UNESCO, which backed the initial satellite imaging that led to the discovery of the water, is seeking funds for a national groundwater mapping programme.

"What we did is only a small part in Turkana and the government would like to expand the mapping for the whole country," said Abou Amani UNESCO's regional hydrologist.

Posted by

8 Photo: UN Navy/Wikimedia

Natural disasters in Asia & Pacific impact 80 million people, UN says

9

When leaders and decision makers from across Asia and the Pacific gather next month in Japan to discuss how to reduce

disaster risks, their top priority will be to build re-silience in a region that saw some 80 million peo-ple affected and nearly $60 billion in economic losses incurred by natural disasters last year.

That’s according to Natural Disasters in Asia and the Pacific: 2014 Year in Review report released to-day by the UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP).

The report said that more than half of the world’s 226 natural disasters occurred in the Asia and Pa-cific region last year.

And although it was a year without a single large-scale catastrophe caused by an earthquake or tsunami, the region experienced severe storms, cross-border floods and landslides, which ac-counted for 85 percent of all disasters, it said.

In addition, more than 6,000 fatalities were caused by natural disasters, compared to 18,744 deaths in 2013, and an estimated 79.6 million peo-ple were affected by natural disasters across the Asia and Pacific, according to the report.

Economic losses owing to natural disasters in 2014 also remained high, amounting to some $59.6 billion, highlighting the lack of economic resilience in the region, said the report, which pre-sented a diagnostic analysis of the region’s state of resilience and lessons learnt.

“One important lesson from 2014 is that end-to-end early warning systems save lives.”

Posted by

Economic losses ow-ing to natural desasters amounted to $59.6 bil-lion in 2014

The report noted that the highest economic loss-es in Asia and the Pacific were incurred from river-basin floods ($16 billion) and Cyclone HudHud ($11 billion) in India, followed by the Ludian earthquake

in China ($6 billion), and the tropical cyclones Lin-gling and Kajiki in Japan ($5.2 billion).

The region was found largely unprepared in its response to cross-border floods and landslides, according to the report.

“Such disasters, which may very well be on the rise because of climate change, require improved regional information exchanges and the joint co-ordination of operations for effective early warn-ing and evacuations,” it said. “The report calls for strengthened regional cooperation to address cross-border disasters.”

ESCAP noted that its findings show how prepar-edness for severe storm events through effective early warning systems has significantly reduced death tolls.

“One important lesson from 2014 is that end-to-end early warning systems save lives,” Shamika Sirimanne, Director of ESCAP’s Disaster Risk Re-duction Division, was quoted as saying.

ESCAP said that leaders and decision-makers across Asia and the Pacific are preparing to fi-nalize a new global framework for disaster risk reduction, which will succeed the 2005 Hyogo Framework for Action, at aconference to be held next month in Sendai, Japan, expected to attract around 8,000 participants.

“The lessons from 2014 clearly show that building resilience remains a key priority in protecting lives and assets in the Asia and the Pacific,” it said.

The Hyogo Framework for Action (HFA) is the first plan to explain, describe and detail the work that is required from all different sectors and actors to reduce disaster losses.

10

At CityLab, Alana Samuels posed a great question: Why are developers still building sprawl? Even as surveys show many peo-

ple they want walkable communities, the builders keep producing car-oriented sprawl, she writes.

Posted by

Preaching walkability but building sprawl

Photo: Chris 73/Wikimedia

11

Samuels looked at Los Vegas and Atlanta, two of America's most sprawling cities, and so her sam-ples may not represent all of America. Yet she has a point: Builders are constructing very similar "product" as they were 10 years ago—just not as much of it.

In a nearly 4,000-word piece, Samuels makes two brief points that deserve more attention:

• "Building some of these developments requires rezoning, which can be difficult to do, especially since it sometimes requires putting in alleys."

• "Of course, it's not simple for companies to change the types of homes they've been building for decades and start something new. Much of the land that they're holding is out on the fringes and would be hard to make walkable."

Land use regulations and trillions of dollars in existing public infrastructure make alternatives to sprawl extremely difficult outside of historic cities and towns, which have limited open land. In other words: Codes and roads are a big problem.

Samuels reports on Inspirada, a Las Vegas mas-ter-planned community. It was launched with ac-cess from publicly-built, high-speed arterial roads located many miles from any walkable place (see photo above). The Walk Score is zero. A developer would need tremendous intelligence, patience, and commitment to create an urban place—bat-tling zoning regulations and the DOT at every step. KB Homes, one of the nation's largest build-ers, lacks those qualities and is unwilling to fight the system. So they build sprawl. It has less to do with the market and more to do with builders fol-lowing the path of least resistance.

That's generally the case among builders who concentrate on single-family houses, which comprise about 6 in 10 new residential units in America. Another part of the development indus-try—multifamily and commercial real estate —has made tremendous strides towards smart growth in the last decade.

Two decades ago, multifamily in America was mostly built in suburban "garden apartment" com-plexes—not so different from Inspirada, but dens-er. Now, in many markets, most of the apartment construction has shifted to walkable urban places.

A similar trend has overtaken office construction, because businesses want to located in mixed-use centers to attract educated employees.

With apartments and offices, "codes and roads" are less of an issue. Developers can pick an in-fill location with existing walkable infrastructure where the regulations allow higher density. Even when commercial real estate developers must cre-ate new infrastructure, they can pick their battles and the benefits are often worth the effort. Land use regulations, street policies, and finance issues still pose problems—but this segment of the de-velopment industry has been more able to adapt to market changes.

The single-family home industry has a culture of sprawl that goes back many generations. It needs help from the public sector to build walkable com-munities. First, communities need form-based codes that enable compact, mixed-use neighbor-hoods. Second, they must plan simple block and street networks connected to walkable through streets. For that to happen, a culture change is needed among transportation engineers and de-partments of transportation.

With those changes in place, builders, like KB Homes, will gain experience building neighbor-hoods—and not just tract housing in the middle of nowhere.

It's not like single-family housing has to be built in the form of sprawl. The mixed-use neighborhood is an alternative with a strong market. In many good urban neighborhoods across America, older single-family houses are snapped up as soon as they come on the market. But the barriers to cre-ate these houses from scratch, with the walkable amenties that people want, are still huge.

The culture change and experience will take time—a generation or more. Until then, expect to see more single-family sprawl. And builders will struggle to adapt to a new market.

By the way, local and national experts on form-based codes, transportation, and real estate mar-kets will gather in Dallas, Texas, April 29 through May 2 at CNU 23 to talk about strategies for meeting the market demand for walkable places. I hope to see you there.

12

The Greater Cairo region reflects Egyptian daily life. It is a vivid example of a wide va-riety of both spatial patterns and socioeco-

nomic conditions. It faces many challenges, like urbanisation, overpopulation, insufficient afford-able housing, frequent electricity cuts, overflow of sewage systems, dominance of private cars, underutilisation of public transport, and margin-alisation of pedestrian movement. But to create more effective and equitable urban strategies that can help overcome these challenges, first we must understand social networks in relation to urban space.

Posted by

Photo: Ben Snooks/Wikimedia

How walkable is Cairo?

13

For decades, the Egyptian government has sup-ported the concept of developing new urban com-munities in the desert to meet housing demand. After the war of 1973, the Egyptian government moved from the socialism policies seen during the Nasser leadership (1956–1970) to the so-called infitah (open-door) policy. The aim was to entice the private sector and to attract international in-vestors. However, the infitahpolicy resulted in pressures on poor citizens. Informal urban growth sped up as a result of the huge numbers of low and middle class citizens who could not afford legal units in the new cities. And even though the government provided affordable housing, it wasn’t enough to attract low-income communities to de-sert cities. Seemingly, other urban factors are also required.

Households with modest means need safe and suitable housing that they can afford. When hous-ing is affordable, low-income and middle class families are able to put nutritious food on the table, receive necessary medical care, and provide reliable day-care for their children. But what if er-rands to urban amenities require a car?

Residents relocated from central Cairo to Ma-saken Osman, some 40 kilometres (25 miles) from their original settlements, found neither the urban amenities nor the public transportation to link them to the wider urban context of their city. Residents had to commute daily to workplaces in their former neighbourhoods of central Cairo. Moreover, people had to establish illegal kiosks along sidewalks and other available public spaces to provide commercial space for the settlement.

Disadvantaged people are more dependent on urban space than advantaged groups, who are more likely to be car-dependent communities. In other words, the upper class have social networks that are independent of space. Wealthy people can commute easily from desert cities to Cairo’s urban core using their private cars. Moreover, they can employ delivery and online services to get their daily needs. For low income people, well-ser-viced and connected settlements are first priority, explaining why desert cities have so far only at-tracted rich people. Bill Hillier, a professor of Ur-ban Morphology, calls this argument the ‘central paradox’ of space —what is good for some groups is bad for others.

The website Walk Score measures the walkability of any place based on distance to amenities, with points given based on walking distance. Places that have amenities within a 5 minute walk are assigned maximum points, while those requiring more than a 30 minute walk are given no points. A location is described as walker’s paradise if it has a Walk Score of 90-100 points, while any ad-dress with a Walk Score lower than 50 points is classified as a Car-Dependent.

Unsurprisingly, the walkability map of Greater Cairo shows that new urban communities are Car-Dependent neighbourhoods where all or most errands require a car. On the other hand, the main urban agglomeration of Greater Cairo, includ-ing formal and informal areas, has a higher Walk Score so most errands can be accomplished on foot. Meanwhile, the quality and quantity of public service and utilities available in formal parts are higher than those offered in informal settlements. For instance, Downtown Cairo has a Walk Score of 98 percent —Walker’s Paradise— whereas El-Zawya El-Hamraa, an informal settlement, has a Walk Score of 81 out of 100, Very Walkable.

The Future of Walkability in Cairo

In March 2014 the campaign of now-President el-Sisi, in collaboration with Arabtec Holding Company, pledged to build ‘one million housing units’ for low-income youths. The capacity of the government for executing this non-profit project is questionable. Regardless, such a project should not only be residential, but also provide amenities, transport links, and adequate infrastructure. Oth-erwise yesterday’s problem of “housing without inhabitants” would be repeated.

The emergence of informal housing is an indica-tion of the failure of government housing provi-sion policies. Formulating a more successful housing policy requires a multivariable approach that is defined as an interaction of several core factors, not just providing affordable housing. Understanding and identifying the type of social networks is a key component of this multivariable approach. A new housing policy for Cairo should provide affordable housing, walkable access to amenities and job opportunities for new commu-nities.

14 Photo: www.fastcoexist.com

Posted by

Delivering water to India’s capital through ‘water ATMs’

15

Two years ago, Anand Shah, founder of Indian firm Sarvajal, wrote in our op-ed pages about how the company had developed solar-powered ‘water ATMs’ to get clean and affordable water to people in remote parts of India. Shah ended by sharing his vision

to have a water vending machine in every village and on every city corner, as a simple solu-tion to a lack of drinking water in the developing world.

By last November Sarvajal had convinced the Delhi authorities to collaborate in a pilot pro-ject, and 24 ATMs are now in place across the city. SciDev.Net visited one of the five ATM machines in Dwarka Sector 3 Resettlement Colony — an unplanned neighbourhood with-out any public services — to find out how the company is expanding its urban presence.

Sarvajal’s facilities treat water and supply the vending machines in the colony, where the water is sold for a fraction of the price of bottled water. Operations manager Amit Mishra takes us through the workings of the equipment that cleans the water, which is then deliv-ered to the solar-powered, cloud-connected vending machines installed in the area. Sava-jal says the water it delivers through the ATMs meets WHO requirements.

Mishra also explains how the company’s work is evolving. In rural parts of India, where internet connectivity is intermittent, Sarvajal generally sells the filtering system to entre-preneurs who then sell the water through 20-litre ATMs. But in Delhi, Sarvajal manages both the filtering process and the supply to ATMs that each hold 500 litres of water. “Here we are doing the partnership with the government,” says Mishra. “Clients are directly con-nected to us in urban areas. In rural areas, the clients are connected to the entrepreneur.”

Even within Delhi, the company uses two public-private partnership models: one financed by Sarvajal and the other, a new arrangement still under consideration, financed by the government.

To set up operations in the city, the government has permitted Sarvajal to use public land rent free for ten years, and to draw the water at each location. I ask Mishra if it was difficult to convince the authorities to get on board with the project. “Initially yes,” he says. “That’s why we have a pilot project for two years.” The government wanted to check whether this model was going to be financially viable for it or not, he explains, and how people would react to the idea of paying for water.

Under the current model, Mishra explains, the company is financing the entire project and also collecting all the revenue. Under a new model being considered by the authorities, the government would pay to install ATMs that the Delhi water board would own. Although Sarvajal would maintain them, the idea is to fill them with municipal water rather than wa-ter treated and monitored by the company. Ten dispensing machines operating under this model, and carrying the Jal water board logo, are already up and running in the city. Under such an arrangement the partnership will bring a financial return for the government, ac-cording to Mishra; hence the need for a pilot phase.

In parts of the city like this colony public services struggle to keep up with rapid urbanisa-tion. “There is no proper piped infrastructure,” he says. “That’s why we have been invited to at least provide potable water. We are being given permission to operate our plants wher-ever there is no fixed pipeline framework available. We are doing that job and we are filling the gap.”

Sarvajal is part of the philanthropic foundation set up by the Indian multinational company Piramal Group.

NB: Press Cutting ServiceThe Urban Gateway culls articles from daily press coverage from around the world. These

articles are posted on the Urban Gateway by way of keeping all users informed about matters of interest. The opinions expressed in these articles are those of the authors and in no way

reflects the opinion of UN-Habitat