In this article, inspired by the movement of open spaces in cities across the world and resilience theory, I argue that city and human resilience are tightly interlinked, and it is possible to positively influence both through utilising the transformative power of open spaces in novel ways.

Last week, our team and I visited Barcelona Smart City Congress and Expo 2022. In this post, I offer some of my thoughts on the current state of smart cities and on how to shift the tech-dominated ecosystem towards Mindful Smart Cities, which is at the core of our DNA at Triple AI SA:

With much of the smart city paradigms being technocentric, our approach is to not only expand the definition envelope of “smartness” to include other forms of smartness, such as emotional intelligence but also build an innovative and therapeutic take to the practice of smart city-making.

The truth is we are very far from having a real smart city. Not because technology is not ready but because we have not progressed enough in our understanding of intelligence; we have not addressed our biases and misconceptions about our brain. Another issue is that we have not done our inner work yet to build a better relationship with the world around us. Indeed, Our understanding of the human brain is constantly changing thanks to ongoing scientific discoveries. Therefore, searching for smart cities in the IoT and AI domains is a futile effort. 

What is research telling us about these complex systems?

You might be surprised that the concept of smart cities was not similar to today’s idea. At the start, they were called digital cities or tele-cities. The main focus was on the power structure of cities between governments and citizens. Then governments began using the digital force to re-establish their influence on people's lives…