The Smart Cities Council Australia New Zealand (SCC ANZ) is preparing a paper that will help various stakeholders leverage federal government deals to build smart cities and communities. 

The paper aims to address the current information gap in smart city development, and help state and local governments, as well as property developers understand core smart city concepts and foster smart community projects.

The federal government is currently negotiating four new City Deal infrastructure projects. The release of the paper will help answer questions about building a smart community from a developer’s perspective, says SCC ANZ’s executive director Adam Beck.

He explained that all smart city deals have large urban infrastructure development projects; the document defines the ‘smart’ components in such projects such as connectivity and digital commerce. The current lack of clarity in smart city development will be addressed by the paper, which will also allow governments at all levels as well as industry to leverage the City Deals program to accelerate the smart cities movement.

The federal government has already established City Deals consisting of large smart city digital transformation components with Western Sydney, Launceston and Townsville in addition to entering into MoUs for Perth, Darwin, Hobart and Geelong.

The City Deals program prioritises jobs, housing and sustainability, governance and regulation, and innovation and digital opportunities; it is also the key mechanism for delivering on the government’s Smart Cities Plan.

Deals announced by the government so far have been strongly focussed on digital innovation and digital smart city development.