“What are the cities of tomorrow? Are cities simply “smart”, equipped with technology? In my opinion, they are human cities. This should be kept in mind when planning the next moves». With these words, the Minister of Digital Governance, Dimitris Papastergiou, began his greeting at the start of the conference 12th Future of Cities Conference 2024, which takes place today, representing Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis.

The main topic was the next day of Municipalities, how cities can become “smart” with the help of technology. As the minister pointed out, “we actually want cities in which citizens will feel good, they will want to live there. This is what we have to keep: how to make cities more attractive and friendlier to children and families, to disabled people, to citizens in general.” He characteristically stated that the key is “to see our cities through the eyes of a child.” Can a child move comfortably in the city, can he take his bike and go to his school, to the gym, to a field to play? To circulate at night safely, are there lights? Are the sidewalks for disabled people made so that they can move around?’

As Mr. Papastergiou pointed out, “however, human cities are not only made by the Municipality, but also by us. Intelligent cities without intelligent citizens – in relation to their social behavior – do not exist”. Defining the definition of a smart city, he emphasized that it is a city that interacts, understands the challenges of our time and tries to change, to be structured so that it can respond to real needs.

He referred to the financing for the transformation of the cities which reaches about half a billion (250 million euros from the NSRF of the Ministry of Digital Governance, 90 million euros from the Recovery Fund for the 17 large municipalities and 130 million euros from the “Antonis” program Tritsis” and additional money that will be given for intelligent systems and programs in order to make the networks more intelligent, functional).

The minister spoke of speeding up the procedures and approvals with the aim of progressing the programs and projects so that by the end of the summer the proposals of the Municipalities will begin to be implemented,but he spoke about “requesting or even demanding the new municipal authorities to change the proposals, which will not be easy at all. What we can do is collate opinions, bridge differences so that we can let the programs run and precious time is not wasted.”

He even commented that “there are no copy paste solutions, what might be smart for an island Municipality in the Aegean may not be the same for a city in Thessaly. We have to put technology in our lives, but it should not be our main concern, to have in our mind how we will solve a problem in our Municipality with an application”.

Regarding the new challenges, new technologies, he emphasized that “the first is the climate crisis, we have to find ways to act proactively, to be proactive in advance. We have to build infrastructure if anything comes up, like generators, communication systems, energy.” He spoke about the valuable role of the application for citizens’ complaints, as he pointed out that it is very important “to listen carefully to what the citizen wants, his complaints, to know at what stage he is, if he has been answered and who took it over, if the problem was solved, and to be able to restore the trust between the citizen and the municipal authority”.

Referring, finally, to the digital assistant of gov.gr, he pointed out that in the next period it will accept a voice command from the user, while he emphasized that with the new bill the basis for the abolition of birth and family status certificates is laid.