With the strong promotion of smart city construction, intelligent transportation, smart healthcare, smart security, and smart energy have all been given great attention. Urban construction starts with transportation, and smart transportation has become an important driving force for economic development, increasingly integrating into various fields of social life, changing people’s ways of living and working. In the tide of smart city construction, smart transportation plays an indispensable role. The following is an article by Shao Yuan, director of the Shenzhen Urban Transportation Planning and Design Research Center (Intelligent Institute), titled ‘Smart Transportation Overall Solution for Future Cities | Creating a ‘4C City’.
The Shenzhen Transportation Center has been committed to the research and application of traffic models and big data for transportation since its establishment 20 years ago, engaging in the planning and design of urban transportation and intelligent transportation. In recent years, we have completely transformed from a traditional planning and design research institution into a provider of comprehensive solutions for urban transportation. Today, I will present preliminary thoughts on the overall plan for smart transportation in future cities. This will be divided into two parts: first, an outlook on future smart cities and smart transportation; second, some initial thoughts.
From the perspective of the entire development process of smart transportation, it can be divided into three stages. In stage 1.0, we focus on the research and development of individual products and the design of functional applications. In stage 2.0, we focus on the interconnectivity of big data and breaking down data barriers. Most recently, we have entered the new smart city stage 3.0, which is a new type of smart city development stage based on the Internet of Things and service-oriented, emphasizing public participation and government-enterprise cooperation.
McKinsey’s research comprehensively summarizes the future trends in transportation development from seven aspects, including shared mobility, electrification of vehicles, autonomous driving, new public transportation, renewable energy, new infrastructure, and the Internet of Things, covering the core aspects of the future. Future smart transportation is based on a data-driven approach of interconnectivity of all things, with various new transportation methods serving as the carriers for the organization of new modes of transport, and new transportation services are manifested in shared mobility.
The United States mentioned in the ‘Emerging Technology Trends Report 2016-2045’ that technologies such as the Internet of Things, data mining, including blockchain, may fundamentally change the way we travel in urban transportation over the next 10 to 20 years, therefore the entire urban transportation industry is also undergoing constant changes.
Focusing on the construction of smart cities in Europe and America, the core content of development includes the construction of four major systems: smart perception system, smart decision-making, smart operations, and smart services. In the future, urban transportation will definitely possess four key characteristics.
The first characteristic is that future-oriented urban transportation is a complex megasystem, under which a comprehensive perception system that is interconnected, diverse, and multidimensional must be established.
The second aspect is the shift in urban management from passive management in the past to smart governance. After 2000, Shenzhen emphasized the concepts of smart growth and smart governance in urban transportation. The prerequisite for smart governance is the support of big data, which is essential for formulating precise management strategies and service measures.
For example, through big data, we can understand what types of vehicles are using our roads, what factors are sensitive at different times and locations, allowing us to formulate precise policies to achieve balanced road network construction.
The third aspect’s characteristic is the concept of mobility proposed by the EU, which has several core features in its planning.
Firstly, our focus has shifted from improving the capacity of transportation facilities and speeds of movement in the past to a human-centered approach that emphasizes accessibility and the quality of transportation, including its impact on urban life, health, the environment, and support for economic vitality.
Second, future cities will emphasize ‘urban governance’ rather than ‘urban management’, focusing on the transformation of government services, service collaboration, and the creation of social value, with urban development highlighting smart governance and smart growth.
The third is the change in thinking patterns. Traditional thinking focuses on the construction of independent systems, while new ideas pay more attention to the coordinated development between systems, particularly the coordination of interests and public participation. Based on big data, it is possible to achieve precise adjustment and closed-loop management from planning to drafting and throughout the entire process, forming a more effective governance model.
The fourth point is to focus on service as the core, reflected in the travel experience of individuals, emphasizing the construction of multi-goals centered around people’s feelings, especially the seamless travel service throughout the entire process that emphasizes personalized experiences.
Based on the four trends mentioned above, future cities will definitely become cities that are perceptible, operational, manageable, and serviceable. These four aspects in urban development represent the ‘4C City’, namely Perception City, Deduction City, Managing City, and Serving City.
First is the holographic perception of the city. This involves constructing a perception system that is oriented towards multiple levels based on big data of spatial units, including smart intersections and smart road segments, achieving multi-level, all-time, and lane-precise perception, shifting from a past focus solely on vehicles to a perception system that includes people, vehicles, roads, weather, and even the entire traffic operating environment. Shenzhen has built a complete new-generation smart road perception system using elements such as smart light poles, smart intersections, and smart road surfaces. Smart light poles have multiple functions, including high-definition video, traffic condition detection, and information dissemination, enabling smart monitoring, traffic flow detection, road hazard identification, information interaction, and multi-target radar tracking, among other functions. This is one of the core carriers of the future traffic holographic perception system.
Secondly, there is the online simulation of cities. Based on big data technology, it achieves traffic tracing technology, deeply understanding the mechanism of various transportation modes’ generation and evolution. For example, this is done through analyzing mobile signaling data to assess the composition of people in different areas. The map allows us to understand their usage of the last mile through the dynamic data monitoring of shared bicycles, including a 24-hour monitoring of pedestrian flow in different areas.
Big data and deep learning technologies have a wide range of applications in the analysis of traffic patterns, discovery of traffic practices, public opinion analysis, and police patrols. In addition, an online simulation system has been established to regress the entire closed-loop activities through data. An online simulation system attempt was made in the core area of Shenzhen, where a large number of sensing systems, including high-definition video, were deployed on the lanes. Through this deployment, we can accurately locate each vehicle, allowing the traffic brain in the backend to realistically restore the entire real-time traffic flow situation, simulate traffic plans, including traffic organization schemes, and provide systematic support for optimizing the entire traffic flow.
This is a real case where traffic police utilized an online simulation system during an accident in a tunnel in Shenzhen. Through real-time online simulations from this system, they alleviated upstream traffic and completed effective clearance within 10 minutes. In the past, without this system, congestion could last for more than half an hour. This case was discussed at the Chinese Public Security Traffic Police Field Conference held in Shenzhen this year.
The third is to intelligently manage the city. This involves constructing a closed-loop control activity that operates in coordination through ‘planning – design – construction – management – data’. A brief introduction will be provided from the perspectives of regional level, city level, and park level.
The core of regional-level management is to establish a control strategy and system oriented towards proactive demand regulation. In Arizona, the United States provides different plans for various groups of people, different travel times, and different travel costs, effectively changing the behavior and plans of 20% of travelers, achieving a balance of time and space on the road network.
