LIFE – Life First Emergency Traffic Control
This project by Catapult smart cities focuses on the medical emergency response. It has as an objective to reduce the time in which emergency vehicles take to reach the patient in threatening or critical conditions. This project combines both the transport system Catapult and the Future City Catapult to create and develop strategies that can allow them to achieve this aim.
Towsend states that the exodus of population in big cities is rapidly increasing and with an estimation of almost 6.5 billions of people moving to the big cities by 2050. This means that there will be more demands in different fields in order to keep the cities running and to ensure a thorough development in those cities. In the case of emergency response such as ambulances for example, this urban expansion as Towsend calls it means that the need to reach out to more patient will definitely become a challenge as the population grows. It is important to develop new strategies that will not just allow the patient in critical conditions to be reach out as quick as possible but also to create a system that will be consistent and productive while taking in consideration issues such as climate change.
With Miller’s concept of a databased environment, developing an advanced satellite navigation system will have an impact of how the ambulances will locate the patient addresses more accurately and therefore a lot more quicker. Miller states that directions and maps are created from a complex maze of digitised database of roads which will provide this service a wealth of useful information.
According to Towsend (2011), there is a better way to build smart cities than to simply call in the engineers. He states that a new batch of new civic leader will show a different way to the audience and the population. That is why he suggests that people need to empower themselves to build cities organically from the bottom up (page 18).
Bibliography
Catapult, F.C. (2017) Home – future cities catapult. Available at: http://futurecities.catapult.org.uk/ (Accessed: 13 Feb 2017)
Miller, V. (2011). Understanding Digital Culture. 1st ed. London: SAGE Publications, pp.12-45.
Townsend, A.M. (2013) Smart cities: Big data, civic hackers, and the quest for a new utopia. New York, NY: W.W. Norton & Company.
The objective of the Future Cities Catapult to use digital technologies to reduce emergency vehicle response times link to Townsend idea that “congestion, global warming, declining health – all can simply be computed away behind the scenes.” (Townsend, 2013: 8). However, this Utopian idea is problematic when it comes to such a valuable commodity as one’s health. There could be serious repercussions if this digital technology was to stall or fail and could lead to someone losing their life. This is also a top down approach, involving the transport system and Future Cities Catapult, rather than what Townsend prefers, the bottom down, grassroots approach involving citizens. (Townsend, 2013: 9).
Comparing digital technologies to the automobiles in the cities of the 1930s, Townsend stated the motorisation was intended to rescue those living in cities from horse manure and factory smoke but instead lead to a sedatory, obese population and scarred countryside. (Townsend, 2013 :14). This leaves unanswered questions and concerns about what the consequences of smart cities could be in the future.
Bibliography:
Future Cities Catapult. 2017. Future Cities Catapult. Available at: http://futurecities.catapult.org.uk (Accessed 16/02/17).
Townsend, A., M. 2013. Smart Cities: Big Data, Civic Hackers and the Quest for a New Utopia. New York: W.W. Norton and Company. Pp.xii-6.
The demands of the NHS in its current structure sees a system that is over stretched and at times the delayed response from the emergency has meant that lives have been lost unnecessarily. Although the idea of an smart solution for traffic control in major cities could help to elevate the pressure currently place on the NHS, if as Townsend suggests there is be a mass exodus to big cities with an estimated population of 6.5 billion by 2050 (Ngoy, 2017). To purely concentrate on delivering smart technology (in the form of traffic control) to major cities alone would in my opinion be a mistake. This would see the development of a two-tier culture with populations living outside an urban environment receiving a lesser service.
Bibliography
Catapult, F.C. (2017) Home – future cities catapult. Available at: http://futurecities.catapult.org.uk/ (Accessed: 13 Feb 2017)
Miller, V. (2011). Understanding Digital Culture. 1st ed. London: SAGE Publications, pp.12-45.
Ngoy, S (2017) Home – LIFE – life first emergency Traffic Control. Available at: http://blogs.brighton.ac.uk/digitalcities/2017/02/13/week-2-digital-cities/ (Accessed: 19 Feb 2017)
Townsend, A.M. (2013) Smart cities: Big data, civic hackers, and the quest for a new utopia. New York, NY: W.W. Norton & Company.