Sustainable Zoning, Land-Use Allocation and Facility Location Optimisation in Smart Cities

Abstract

Many cities around the world are facing immense pressure due to the expediting growth rates in urban population levels. The notion of 'smart cities' has been proposed as a solution to enhance the sustainability of cities through effective urban management of governance, energy and transportation. The research presented herein examines the applicability of a mathematical framework to enhance the sustainability of decisions involved in zoning, land-use allocation and facility location within smart cities. In particular, a mathematical optimisation framework is proposed, which links through with other platforms in city settings, for optimising the zoning, land-use allocation, location of new buildings and the investment decisions made regarding infrastructure works in smart cities. Multiple objective functions are formulated to optimise social, economic and environmental considerations in the urban space. The impact on underlying traffic of location choices made for the newly introduced buildings is accounted for through optimised assignment of traffic to the underlying network. A case example on urban planning and infrastructure development within a smart city is used to demonstrate the applicability of the proposed method.Energies 2019, 12, 1318 2 of 23 increasingly reflected in the operations of existing cities, resulting in an interrelated platform between large numbers of citizens, transport networks, services and urban assets and facilities [9].Decision-making in planning and operations of smart cities needs to be structured around two main considerations, namely strategic and tactical decisions [10]. Yet, current emphasis in the literature is on the technical interfaces making up the various data-exchange enabling platforms placed within the cities, with little emphasis on the strategic and tactical urban planning aspects of smart cities. Within the area of strategic decision-making in city planning, zoning of the city and the location of its operating facilities, including schools, hospitals and so forth, are both of significant relevance [11]. An appropriate selection of zone clusters and the subsequent selection of locations to place buildings in form the main components that are involved in city design. In cities, the positioning of new buildings leads to the generation of traffic demand in the existing network structure [12]. This causes additional traffic loadings on the existing network, and if not well planned for, can result in major transportation delays to network users. Traffic congestion is thought to result in over $121 billion in losses [13] and can increase the amount of carbon emissions from traffic by more than 53% [14]. Another important strategic consideration is the development of the underlying travel network of the region. Specifically, the development of the transport network will be based on the capacities required to handle the initiated travel on the transport networks, while the operations of the network will in turn be associated with the established capacity of the network, along...

A Theoretical Research Framework of Future Sustainable Urban Freight Transport for Smart Cities

“…In cities, the locations of new buildings create a traffic demand in the existing network structure [80]. This causes external traffic loadings on the existing network, and it leads to major transportation delays for network users if planning is not optimal [11]. In consequence, this solution restricts the sustainability of urban freight transport in the aspects of economic and social dimensions.…”

“…As mentioned previously, technological development has motivated the formulation of smart cities. Although this concept is based on the development of information and communications technology (ICT) and the internet of things (IoT), it also influences the physical perspective of urban development, such as zones, infrastructure allocations, and urban transport networks [11,15]. It is noted that universal agreement on a specific definition of a "smart city" is still lacking at present, and its primary field is in the usage of ICT and IoT in the sectors of infrastructure, buildings, and energy [84].…”

“…In recent years, the concept of the "smart city" has increasingly become a popular topic in the academic field. This concept has arisen as a solution for improving the sustainability and livability of cities through the effective urban management of governance, energy, and transportation [11,12]. Since 2018, some research has focused on the topic of sustainable transport for smart cities, which primarily surround smart mobility.…”

“…Tobey et al (2019) [15] demonstrated a conceptual framework for planning smart communities to take account of sustainable transport, which employed an iterative three-phase development loop. Hammad et al (2019) [11] proposed a mathematical optimization framework to optimize zoning, land-use allocation, the location of novel constructions, and investment decision-making related to infrastructure projects in smart cities. This framework is able to connect to other platforms in a city setting.…”

Toward an Efficient and Sustainable Use of Energy in Industries and Cities

“…Hammad et al [107] focused on smart cities, presenting an optimization of zoning, land-use and facility location. Once again, the authors start from the analysis of energy consumption in the world, pointing out that the majority of this consumption is due to the urban regions where almost 55% of the overall world population lives.…”