Gordon

Masdar City an early & iconic greenfield smart city

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There is not a single week that passes without being asked “so what happened at Masdar City”.

Masdar City was for me, like drinking from a fire-hydrant. Hundreds of consultants, multiple meetings booked at the same time frequently by others e.g. a meeting with a European Ambassador and then a US Foundation directly following then a design meeting and then a infrastructure meeting with consultants presenting their weekly update.

It was both chaotic and exhilarating and laid the foundations for my career in cities.

Singapore has a secret sauce

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If I am not being asked about Masdar City, someone will ask me “so whats the Singapore model and secret” ? Singapore has a most amazing and well organised single layer government that takes advantage of the small size of the island. The size and governance allows them to make long-term strategic plans and actually implement them.

Sagrada

Barcelona an early Smart City

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I was a trusted advisor to Barcelona between 2010 and 2013 and saw their amazing smart city journey. Their journey was fascinating. They were literally pioneers of pushing the concept of smart cities by attracting Cisco and IBM and other tech companies into their city. They then created the now global Smart City Expo and built the story of Barcelona being a smart city.