Periodic Reporting for period 2 - DUET (Digital Urban European Twins for smarter decision making)
Reporting period: 2020-12-01 to 2022-11-30
Policy makers have been constantly looking for tools that could help them
> Find optimal solutions faster, safer, cheaper, especially at times when multiple challenges overlap (climate crisis, energy crisis, migration crisis, public health crisis, cost of living crisis), compounding the risks involved
> Unlock insights from data that is collected in large quantities but is rarely utilised 100%
> Better understand the effectiveness of current measures and what the intended and unintended impact of new interventions might be
> Effectively manage competing priorities of different social groups e.g. some citizens would like their city to be more age-friendly, some youth-friendly, some wildlife-friendly, some would like to reduce carbon footprint by reducing lighting in public spaces, some would like to increase public safety and tourism potential, so will advocate for more lighting across the city
DUET provides cost-effective virtual city replicas which make it easy to understand the complex interrelation between traffic, air quality, noise and other urban factors. Powerful analytics model the expected impacts of potential change to help public authorities make better evidence-based operational decisions and longer term policy choices. Acting as a container for models, data and simulations, DUET's architecture facilitates the flow of information from diverse static, historic, open, and real-time data sources, translating it into easily digestible output and insights for smart city decision-makers. As more and more cities begin to realize the full potential of urban data and digital technologies, digital twins will offer more opportunities to drive sustainable growth and competitiveness, in Europe and beyond. Stakeholders will be able to engage in a meaningful discussion to explore and co-create effective policy interventions in the key Horizon 2020 target areas of transportation, environment, and health. In this respect, digital twins act as a conversation starter, an enabler of two-way policy dialogue that brings citizens closer to smart cities.
> Find optimal solutions faster, safer, cheaper, especially at times when multiple challenges overlap (climate crisis, energy crisis, migration crisis, public health crisis, cost of living crisis), compounding the risks involved
> Unlock insights from data that is collected in large quantities but is rarely utilised 100%
> Better understand the effectiveness of current measures and what the intended and unintended impact of new interventions might be
> Effectively manage competing priorities of different social groups e.g. some citizens would like their city to be more age-friendly, some youth-friendly, some wildlife-friendly, some would like to reduce carbon footprint by reducing lighting in public spaces, some would like to increase public safety and tourism potential, so will advocate for more lighting across the city
DUET provides cost-effective virtual city replicas which make it easy to understand the complex interrelation between traffic, air quality, noise and other urban factors. Powerful analytics model the expected impacts of potential change to help public authorities make better evidence-based operational decisions and longer term policy choices. Acting as a container for models, data and simulations, DUET's architecture facilitates the flow of information from diverse static, historic, open, and real-time data sources, translating it into easily digestible output and insights for smart city decision-makers. As more and more cities begin to realize the full potential of urban data and digital technologies, digital twins will offer more opportunities to drive sustainable growth and competitiveness, in Europe and beyond. Stakeholders will be able to engage in a meaningful discussion to explore and co-create effective policy interventions in the key Horizon 2020 target areas of transportation, environment, and health. In this respect, digital twins act as a conversation starter, an enabler of two-way policy dialogue that brings citizens closer to smart cities.
The Local Digital Twin (LDT) platform can be accessed by anyone at http://citytwin.eu/. It features 17 use cases that demonstrate the value of LDTs to urban decision makers as well as the wider public. The use cases cover a diverse range of policy scenarios: street closure, bridge closure, deployment of solar equipment, shadow mapping, emergency planning. People can experiment with these scenarios on their own by following guidance in the use case description.
DUET team would be happy to talk to public administrations that would like to have a similar platform for their city. The underlying open-source architecture is flexible enough to accommodate the needs of new adopters in terms of use cases, datasets, models, visuals, and analytical features. To discuss how DUET can help your city improve urban planning, send an email to duet@digitalurbantwins.com.
DUET published copious guidance on how to get started with LDTs. The Starter Kit is available on the main project website: https://www.digitalurbantwins.com/. The Starter Kit was created around the LDT maturity model that helps cities evolve their digital twins from less to more advanced. Specifically, from strategy development, to experimental twins, to insightful twins, to intelligent twins.
The main project website includes a wealth of other useful information that has been tailored to
> policy makers: city guide to legal compliance, policy brief on starting own LDT, ethical principles for data driven decisions
> researchers: typology of LDTs, pilot testing cycle results, business and exploitation scenarios
> technology experts: DUET system architecture, cloud design for model calibration and simulation, multi-layered security model
> general public: women in GovTech, FAQ, communication material
DUET team would be happy to talk to public administrations that would like to have a similar platform for their city. The underlying open-source architecture is flexible enough to accommodate the needs of new adopters in terms of use cases, datasets, models, visuals, and analytical features. To discuss how DUET can help your city improve urban planning, send an email to duet@digitalurbantwins.com.
DUET published copious guidance on how to get started with LDTs. The Starter Kit is available on the main project website: https://www.digitalurbantwins.com/. The Starter Kit was created around the LDT maturity model that helps cities evolve their digital twins from less to more advanced. Specifically, from strategy development, to experimental twins, to insightful twins, to intelligent twins.
The main project website includes a wealth of other useful information that has been tailored to
> policy makers: city guide to legal compliance, policy brief on starting own LDT, ethical principles for data driven decisions
> researchers: typology of LDTs, pilot testing cycle results, business and exploitation scenarios
> technology experts: DUET system architecture, cloud design for model calibration and simulation, multi-layered security model
> general public: women in GovTech, FAQ, communication material
DUET has been a unique collaborative endeavour where technology providers worked side by side with public administrations to create a LDT solution that is right for them, taking into account population size, policy needs, data culture, governance model, and more. The presence of cities with different properties meant that we could study our implementation results from different viewpoints to better understand what works and doesn’t in different contexts. The main impacts and lessons learned are derived from real-life experience of building and testing LDTs in Athens, Flanders, and Pilsen.
Athens: One of the challenges and main lessons learned concern the openness, accessibility, quality and format of available datasets. In Greece, local open data is only starting to gain traction. Many datasets are not aggregated, provided in non-compatible formats or simply closed (private). Through local testing cycles involving citizens, businesses, academia and policy makers, the Athens pilot concluded that a LDT can become a trusted urban data collector and/or repository of city information which stakeholders from various different domains and backgrounds can use to support better informed decisions and improve urban situations.
Flanders: One of the highlights of the Flemish pilot is the integration of local and regional models, systems and datasets e.g. the use of Flanders traffic model in Ghent, the fusion of regional air quality models (from VITO) with local 3D LOD2 data, and the merger of local and regional sensor networks for better coverage/granularity. The pilot was able to make these different components “talk to each other” via a complex system of several standards-based subsystems. Also, the process required extensive cooperation between different departments (e.g. data and information, mobility, environment) especially in the field of roadworks.
Pilsen: LDT adoption required changes in established practices and a desire to try to do things differently than before. What was especially important to obtain is buy-in from key stakeholders, so the Pilsen pilot had to convince local decision makers to give their endorsement, by showcasing the technology’s benefits using concrete examples, such as those provided on citytwin.eu. Building a digital twin is a gradual, step-by-step process. The pilot started with available data in one or two domains (e.g. traffic, environment, 3D data), focusing on high-quality datasets, including IoT data, and subsequently added other domains to the mix. The next step was to move from data analysis and visualisation towards predictive models. This allowed LDT outputs to provide powerful data-based evidence for policy making.
Athens: One of the challenges and main lessons learned concern the openness, accessibility, quality and format of available datasets. In Greece, local open data is only starting to gain traction. Many datasets are not aggregated, provided in non-compatible formats or simply closed (private). Through local testing cycles involving citizens, businesses, academia and policy makers, the Athens pilot concluded that a LDT can become a trusted urban data collector and/or repository of city information which stakeholders from various different domains and backgrounds can use to support better informed decisions and improve urban situations.
Flanders: One of the highlights of the Flemish pilot is the integration of local and regional models, systems and datasets e.g. the use of Flanders traffic model in Ghent, the fusion of regional air quality models (from VITO) with local 3D LOD2 data, and the merger of local and regional sensor networks for better coverage/granularity. The pilot was able to make these different components “talk to each other” via a complex system of several standards-based subsystems. Also, the process required extensive cooperation between different departments (e.g. data and information, mobility, environment) especially in the field of roadworks.
Pilsen: LDT adoption required changes in established practices and a desire to try to do things differently than before. What was especially important to obtain is buy-in from key stakeholders, so the Pilsen pilot had to convince local decision makers to give their endorsement, by showcasing the technology’s benefits using concrete examples, such as those provided on citytwin.eu. Building a digital twin is a gradual, step-by-step process. The pilot started with available data in one or two domains (e.g. traffic, environment, 3D data), focusing on high-quality datasets, including IoT data, and subsequently added other domains to the mix. The next step was to move from data analysis and visualisation towards predictive models. This allowed LDT outputs to provide powerful data-based evidence for policy making.