Manchester and Wuhan - Sister Cities Collaborate to Build Smart Cities

By Bo Ning & Liu Dongli

The concept of smart cities is now trending around the globe and is anticipated to be the way of life in the future. Since IBM launched its Smarter Planet initiative in 2008 which seeks to resolve problems faced by Mother Earth,such as population growth,environmental issues and energy use, through digitalized and smarter systems, nations have enthusiastically started building their smart cities.

Wuhan in China and Manchester in the UK are both industrial cities with long histories. They both play important roles in their own countries. And in making cities smart, they’ve made remarkable achievements.

Manchester has been a leader in the world arena, implementing smart city projects in various industries with manufacturing,energy, medical, and digital innovations. One such example is the City Verve project which is backed by the British government with an investment of 10 million pounds. The program aims to test better services for citizens using Internet of Things technologies.Its Smart Bus Stops (interactive bus stops) can update bus operators with data about their passengers, and the sensors installed along the bus routes will collect and send data to bus stops to help passengers manage their trips. The City Verve project also includes smart healthcare,lighting, air quality control and many other aspects.

In 2012, China released the first list of pilot cities for implementing smart city concepts, and Wuhan was among them. Today, in cloud computing infrastructure, Wuhan has built the first location source data center in China, which allows smart sensing, analyzing,serving, and decision-making for geospatial data. The Wuhan Supercomputing (Data) Center,currently under construction,will be capable of handling 10PB(10*1024 TB) of data at 1PF (1000 trillion times/second) at its initial stage. Through building cloud computing, supercomputing and other communication infrastructure, Wuhan is aiming to form an electronic information industry cluster.

眼下，智慧城市的建设已经成了各国关心的大事，智慧城市的未来与人们的生活将密不可分。自2008年IBM提出“智慧地球”理念，期望以数字化和智能化手段解决地球所面临的人口、环境、能源等问题以来，全世界掀起了智慧城市建设的热潮。

中国的武汉和英国的曼彻斯特，都是世界著名的老牌工业城市，在各自的国家都起着非常重要的作用，两个城市在智慧城市建设方面也都取得了一些可喜的成就。

曼彻斯特实践着层出不穷的智慧城市项目，在先进制造业、能源、医疗创新和数字领域具有世界领先水平。比如获得1000万英镑政府资金支持的曼彻斯特“城市活力”项目，旨在利用物联网技术去测试更好的服务并且提供给居民。其智慧巴士站（互动式巴士站），可帮助公交车运营者了解乘客等待、园区内以及沿着通勤路线的传感器网络数据等，帮助人们把握时间，处理好手中的事。该项目还包括智慧医疗、智能照明以及智能空气质量监测等等许多方面。

2012年，中国公布首批90个智慧城市试点地区，武汉是其中之一。如今，在云计算基础建设方面，武汉市已建成国内首个位置源数据中心，初步实现了地理空间信息的“智慧感知、智慧分析、智慧服务、智慧决策”。建设中的武汉超算（数据）中心，初期将达到1PF（1000万亿次/秒）、10PB（10X1024TB字节）的服务能力，通过云计算、超算等重大信息基础设施建设，形成电子信息产业聚集区。

Wuhan also launched Easy Transport, a smart transportation management system which has more than 40 functions, to centrally control traffic coordination and car administration, in order to relieve traffic congestions. On a larger scale,transportation management center can allocate resources to nearby congested areas in a timely manner based on real-time information;on a more personal level, drivers can find out real-time traffic data through the Easy Transport app to plan their driving routes to divert their courses away from or at least avoid aggregating congestions.

In recent years, the two cities have been making more and more frequent communications on smart cities construction. At the end of February 2018, Sir Richard Leese, Deputy Mayor of Greater Manchester together with a delegation of 30 entrepreneurs,visited Hubei Province. At the Greater Manchester-Wuhan City Circle Cooperation Summit held on February 27, experts and scholars communicated in depth about how the two cities can collaborate and learn from each other in fields such assmart cities and health innovation.

为缓解交通拥堵，该市建立“易行江城”智慧交通系统，集成行车停车诱导、车驾管服务等40多项功能。一方面，交管指挥中心对城市拥堵，可实时调度，民警及时就近处置，缩短拥堵时间；另一方面，司机可通过“易行江城”APP和道路行车诱导屏，了解实时路况，合理计划行车路线，既避开堵点，又减少堵源，共治共享。

近年来，两个城市间关于智慧城市建设的交流逐渐频繁起来，在智慧城市建设方面，互相学习，取长补短。2018年2月底，大曼彻斯特郡副郡长理查德·里斯爵士率政府及企业代表团一行30人访问湖北。在2月27日的大曼彻斯特郡与武汉城市圈合作交流会上，专家与学者就智慧城市、创新医疗等领域的发展与合作进行深入交流，双方都表示有相互借鉴的空间。

在智慧医疗领域，曼城的先进医疗科研成果值得学习，而武汉在疾病防疫以及互联网+在医疗领域的应用，也十分令英方称道。

以人口老龄化这一各国共同面临的问题为例，曼城利用高科技手段，如借助思特沃克公司专门为独居老人研发的远程健康监护系统，在老人家中及身上部署多种传感器，获取心率、运动、上厕所的次数、睡眠时间等数据，计算老人高血压、心脏病等疾病风险，以便让老人的家人随时了解其健康状况，及早应对可能出现的疾病。武汉则通过发布健康武汉客户端、建立全市大数据平台、推广电子健康卡、数字化家庭医生和远程医疗服务等措施，帮助患者找到医生、医生共享资源和经验，普及健康教育，以实现预防与治疗并重。

交流会上，武汉与曼彻斯特市签署《2018年友好交流合作行动计划》，将在地方政府合作、经贸、科教、体育、文化、旅游等多领域深化合作，包含共同申报“对华友好城市交流合作奖”、互相提供投资项目蓝皮书、利用两市高校校友资源发展新时代“校友经济”、促成曼彻斯特诺贝尔奖得主和著名科学家来汉讲学和开展科研合作等事项。

曼城与武汉这两座在人类历史上扮演过重要角色的名城，如今依托科技的力量与智慧的理念，共同站立在世界潮头。

交流会上，专家畅谈智慧城市建设　Panel discussion on smart cities at the summit

In smart healthcare,Manchester has its expertise in scientific research, while Wuhan’s experience in disease prevention and applying Internet technologies in healthcare is well praised.

For example, in dealing with the problem of an aging society, a shared concern for many countries, Manchester has adopted high technologies such as ThoughtWorks’ remote health monitoring system specially designed for senior people living alone. The system collects physical data such as heart rate,exercises, times of excretion,sleeping times, etc. from sensors placed on the body and around the house to calculate the risk of the person suffering from hypertension, heart diseases,and other maladies. The data allows the family of an elderly person to understand his/her health condition in order to intervene at an early stage.Meanwhile in Wuhan, experts have developed Health Wuhan app, and are building a city-wide big data platform, promoting e-health cards, and digitalizing family doctor and remote medical services, which can help patients find suitable doctors, allow doctors to share resources and experience, and educate people on health knowledge, so that both prevention and treatment of diseases can be achieved.

At the summit, Wuhan and Manchester signed the 2018 Communication and Collaboration Joint Action Plan.The two cities will deepen their collaborations in government cooperation, economy and trade,science and education, culture and tourism, as well as jointly apply for the China International Friendship Cities Award. The cities will provide each other with blue books on investment projects, promote the alumni economy by utilizing the two cities’ university resources, and bring Nobel winner scientists to visit Wuhan to lecture or run joint research projects in universities.

Manchester and Wuhan,historically significant cities in their own countries, are now hand-in-hand leading the smart city trend with the help of technologies and innovative concepts.

In the Economist Intelligence Unit’s list of the World’s Most Livable Cities in 2016,Manchester was the most livable city in the UK. In China Economy and Life Survey 2017-2018,Wuhan was voted the happiest city. The blueprints revealed in the information era by the sister cities with over 30 years’friendship are now demonstrating prospects of a much better living space for everyone.◆

Background

There isn’t an internationally agreed definition for the vision and concept of a smart city.

According to the definition given by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, US in 2013, smart cities “should be seen as systems of systems,and that there are emerging opportunities to introduce digital nervous systems,intelligent responsiveness,and optimization at every level of system integration.”

《经济学人》在2016年“全球宜居城市调查”中，将曼彻斯特列为英国最宜居城市，武汉也于2017年被《中国经济生活大调查（2017—2018）》评为中国最幸福城市。这对友谊长达30多年友好城市，在信息时代逐渐为人们展现出的城市蓝图，无疑在向我们证明，人类未来的生存空间会更加舒适和美好。◆

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国际上关于智慧城市的概念和愿景众说纷纭。

美国麻省理工学院2013年将智慧城市定义为“系统之上的系统，且在系统集成的各个层面都有可能引入数字神经系统、智能响应和优化。”学者尼茨坎普等人则认为智慧城市“投入人力与社会资本以及传统（运输）和现代（信息通信技术）通讯基础设施，通过多方参与治理，以智慧方式管理自然资源，以促进经济可持续增长，提升人类生活质量。”

笔者采访英国索尔福德大学建筑学院院长希沙姆·艾尔卡迪时，他给出一个以生态为中心的定义，认为“智慧城市应当能够根据不同的情况和过去的经验，及时调整状态或行动，能对城市自身进行组织管理。”

他认为，城市也是生态系统的一个部分，城市发展应当效法自然。构建智慧城市，就是要给城市加上一个智慧的“大脑”，使之能够自我发展、自我完善。

这种向自然界学习生存之道的观点，与中国古代哲人“天人合一，道法自然”的思想契合。老子说：“人法地，地法天，天法道，道法自然。”宇宙自然是大天地，人是一个小天地。人和自然本质相通，一切人事均应顺乎自然规律，达到人与自然和谐共处。

英国索尔福德大学建筑学院院长希沙姆·艾尔卡迪Professor Hisham Elkadi, Dean of the School of the Built Environment, University of Salford UK giving a speech at the summit

Nijkamp and his fellow scholars concluded, “A city may be called'smart' when investments in human and social capital and traditional (transport) and modern (ICT) communication infrastructure fuel sustainable economic development and a high quality of life, with a wise management of natural resources,through participatory action and engagement.”

When being interviewed,Hisham Elkadi, Dean of the School of the Built Environment,University of Salford UK, gave an eco-centered definition of smart city which emphasizes that“Smart cities should be those who have the ability to vary their status or actions in response to varying situations and past experience;those that have self-organizing characteristics.”

He believes that a city is a part of the ecological system, and that it should mimick the nature.Building smart cities is like giving a brain to a city, to enable it to develop and improve on its own.

This view of learning from nature coincides with Chinese Daoist philosophies. Laozi said,“For I am abstracted from the world, the world from nature,nature from the way, and the way from what is beneath abstraction.” The universe is large while men are small. Essentially,men and nature are connected.Therefore, men should follow nature’s rules to achieve harmony and balance.