At the conference “Sustainable Cities” held in Zagreb, the research “Analysis of Digital Readiness of Croatian Cities 2020” was presented, in which the City of Rijeka was named the best city in the Smart city category in Croatia.
As a criterion for the award, smart, i.e. technologically advanced solutions, as well as the efficiency and individual project recognition in this domain were taken. Some of the criteria that were evaluated in setting the Smart city standard concern:
- Smart administrations-the use of technologies in the work of city administrations, e-services, e-citizens;
- Greenfield program-technology incubators, incentives for the cities engaged in ICT technology;
- Utilities – E-bills, energy savings through smart public lighting;
- Transport -smart parking, infrastructure (traffic lights, roundabouts), public transport aligned with the use of technology;
- Security -the use of technologies in the citizen security, detection/prevention of crime, public alarms;
- Community life – smart parks, public Wi-Fi, etc.
This research brought interesting insights into the general characteristics of the digital services that the city administrations offer to their citizens, and at the same time, the research offered city ranking and insight into how they have progressed (or stagnated) compared to 2019 and what their current rank is.
In fact, in 2019, the conference “Development Strategy of Smart Cities” was held in preparation for the competition and selection of the cities for the “Smart City” award. Then, the research results on digital readiness of the cities in the Republic of Croatia were presented for the first time by Apsolon company, as well as the research methodology that gives the most relevant results for the local governments enabling comparison, but also monitoring the progress of the cities in a time perspective.
The research that will be carried out within CEKOM (Center of Competence for Smart Cities) fully covers the key dimensions of a smart city.
