Joburg – a Smart City that’s getting smarter

05 May 2016

 

The City of Johannesburg is becoming smarter as more residents get connected to the internet

In his State of the City Address (SOCA) in Turffontein on Wednesday, Johannesburg Executive Mayor Councillor Parks Tau said the City’s Massive Open Online Varsity (MOOV), part of the Vulindlel’ eJozi youth empowerment programme, had already opened opportunities for more than 4 000 young Johannesburg residents. MOOV also uses state-of-the-art video-enabled learning to turn City libraries into online universities.

 

“Our new tech savvy economic democracy is rising because we’re partnering with the ICT sector. We welcome the confirmed commitments by Microsoft and IBM to train thousands of youth through the MOOV initiative on basic administrative and vocational skills,” said Mayor Tau.

He said the movement of data and information would define the fate of cities in the 21st century – just as the movement of people had defined the nature of cities for as long as they had existed. The transformation of Johannesburg into a Smart City began with the rollout of 1 100km of broadband and fibre-optic cable.

To date the City has connected 66 of its 87 libraries to high-speed internet, available at no cost to the public. Libraries with access include those in Orange Farm, Lenasia, Diepsloot, Randburg, Westbury, Emmarentia, Cosmo City, Ennerdale, Florida, Roodepoort and all across Soweto.

“The City has also created a new municipal-owned entity, MTC, to manage and optimise the use of the fibre network and developed the ‘Maru a Jozi’ portal platform, a cloud platform enabling free access to a range of basic online services through a one simple to use portal.

“Our Maru a Jozi platformme is already helping those with little experience of the internet at the city’s 408 free Wi-Fi hotspots, including the wireless mesh over Braamfontein. These have logged 1.3 million hits since the start of this financial year,” added Mayor Tau.

The City has also rolled out the Digital Ambassadors programme, an initiative aimed at training 720 000 households across Johannesburg in digital literacy. To date 24 800 households have been reached. The City has also seen an improvement in healthcare management with its new e-health system, a digital records system that aims to reduce waiting times at healthcare facilities.

“Patient records are being centralised and healthcare professionals are able – at the push of a button – to recall the history of treatment and continue to provide care and service,” explained Mayor Tau.

The new e-health patient record system will be implemented in 15 clinics across Soweto by June. Through the use of technology, the streets of Johannesburg have been made safer with CCTV security cameras all connected to the Intelligent Operations Centre, a centralised command centre able to track suspicious behaviour and ensure rapid reaction.

“Smart technology – and smarter policing – is already reducing crime levels in the City. As a result of investments in the CCTV system, serious crimes such as bank robberies and cash heists were significantly reduced in the CBD. There is also a significant decline in crimes such as common assault, theft of motor vehicles, burglaries and residential crimes. In 2014-2015 alone we experienced a reduction of 22% in actual incidents of crime,” said Mayor Tau.