Richmond submitted its final Smart Cities proposal earlier this month in the hopes of winning $10 million and now, the city is calling on vendors, contractors or service providers to partner on the project.
Richmond is one of 10 finalists in a national competition asking cities to use data and technology to improve residents’ lives. At the heart of Richmond’s Smart Cities vision is connected technology, says the city’s spokesperson, Ted Townsend.
“Around the world there’s literally billions of different devices that are connected to the internet and are producing different types of data. All that data potentially is valuable information, particularly to a local government in terms of how we manage the city,” Townsend, who is also a co-lead of the City’s Smart Cities Project Team, told the Richmond News last December.
“The challenge is, many of those devices don’t speak to each other. They’re not interconnected.”
In its Smart Cities vision, the city has proposed to create an “Intelligent Operation Hub” that will integrate data and coordinate emergency responses in the event of a major emergency, or even in the case of smaller day to day events such as traffic congestion.
While winners of the competition won’t be announced until May 14, the city is gathering submissions of interest from vendors to provide “early information that will help to structure future communication and procurement processes.”
The city says this will help to identify partners capable of supporting its Smart Cities vision, adding that implementation of the Smart Cities work program will take place over the next five years and that many of the initiatives identified in the city’s proposal will proceed with or without the $10 million prize.
The deadline for responses is March 28. Full information can be found on the B.C. Bid website.
“Our Smart Cities Challenge proposal would make our community more resilient and improve quality of life for all our residents,” said Richmond Mayor Malcolm Brodie in a press release.
“It will build upon Richmond’s recognized best practices leadership in flood prevention, emergency response and sustainability and our award-winning digital strategy.”
