i3 - January/February 2020 - 79

Policy
The "Digital
Mayor's Office"
on one side of
my office
symbolizes the
status of Seoul
as a global
smart city.

present at CES 2020. I hope many people
visit the Seoul booth in Eureka Park and
enjoy the charm of the smart city of Seoul.

Q How is Seoul paving the way for other
cities to become smart cities?
Ever since Rutgers University in the U.S.
started the Global E-Governance Survey on
the major 100 cities around the world, Seoul
has never let go of its number one position in
the performance of municipal e-government.
Seoul is a state-of-the-art city that boasts the
world's best information and communication network where people can enjoy free
high-speed Wi-Fi even in moving buses and
subway trains. It also has the highest retention rate of smartphone users on the globe.
Based on these strengths, Seoul is now
writing a new chapter in the history of smart
cities in various areas that are closely linked
with the lives of its citizens, such as in transportation, economy and the environment.
Among them, the area in great demand
and with the biggest ripple effects on the

citizens is transportation. Seoul has significantly enhanced the convenience of public
transportation through "Seoul's Intelligent
Traffic System" (ITS), Smart Transportation
Card and Bus Information System (BIS).
C TA . t e c h / i 3

In 2010, Seoul established the WeGO
(World Smart Sustainable Cities Organization)
to support sustainable urban development
and also to narrow the information gap
through exchanges and cooperations with
world cities for the smart city area. WeGo
has members from 177 cities and corporations. Seoul is also supporting other cities
by exporting smart city solutions including
TOPIS (Transport Operation and Information
Service), loT-embedded LED streetlights, and
smart garbage processing systems.

Q How are you using data to provide better
experiences for city residents?
"Big Data," so-called "the crude oil of
the 21st century," is the key driving force to
operate a smart city. The Seoul Metropolitan
Government has created the foundation to
produce, store, process and utilize big data,
and is scientifically analyzing the data and
making reasonable inferences. The goal of
Seoul is to provide innovative alternatives to
solve urban problems and to focus the city's

capabilities in making significant changes to
the lives of the citizens.
The most representative case is the latenight bus called "Owl Bus," which is an innovative scheme for night-time transportation.

To determine the Owl Bus's routes, we
analyzed three billion cases of big data (i.e.
mobile phone calls). A total of nine routes
of the Owl Bus have been designated in the
areas with the highest demand for public
transportation at night-time. These buses
are now responsible for the safe trip home
for more than 10,000 people a night.
Moreover, Seoul combined
LTE signal data of mobile carriers and the public data of the
city government and produced
"Daily Population Data" that
can be utilized in various areas,
for instance, the analysis of
commercial districts, marketing activities, welfare, transportation, and other various
municipal policies. The Seoul
Metropolitan Government is
taking a step further to consecutively install
50,000 IoT-embedded sensors across the
city and is gathering "city life data" including
fine dust, noise, vibration, floating population, UV rays and more.
With the accumulated data, Seoul is creating brand new services, such as Intelligent
CCTV, AI taxis, and IoT sharing parking. In
this process, the basic philosophy determining the success of smart city policies is
"governance" and "openness." The Seoul
Metropolitan Government is establishing
the "Data Storage" system where anyone
can see and use the public data of Seoul. A
total of 528 kinds of the city government's
administrative system data is expected
to be stored. I look forward to seeing that
big data and collective intelligence create
innovative services so that every citizen is
allowed to enjoy the benefits from it.

Q Can you talk about sustainability issues
and what you are doing to resolve them?
If the paradigm of "growth" and
"development" was at the center of urban
civilization in the 20th century, "sustainability" is what determines urban civiliza-

tion in the 21st century. Seoul has achieved
unprecedented rapid growth. However,
it is also true that this growth-centered
development left us with various wounds
of environmental destruction, community
JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2020

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i3 - January/February 2020

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