African cities need intelligence, not just smart city infrastructure

I am less interested in whether a city can call itself smart than whether it can act intelligently when something goes wrong. Too many smart city conversations still begin with the visible symbols of progress, for example, cameras, sensors, apps, dashboards, connected streetlights, smart meters, and control rooms with large screens. While useful, none of them on their own makes a city intelligent.  For many African cities, the real problem is not a lack of ambition. Urbanisation is placing pressure on transport, water, electricity, housing, public safety, emergency response, waste management, and municipal service delivery. At the same time, many municipalities are expected to do more with ageing infrastructure, limited budgets, fragmented systems, and uneven data quality.

Raccontata daengineeringnews.co.za