Robin Daniels, Redpill Group Ltd & Saibal Chowdhury, Urbanetic Pte Ltd.
Redpill Group client, Urbanetic has been selected to deliver an envisioning and scenario planning tool to design a new Indian state capital.
Urbanetic has been selected by the master planner, Surbana Jurong Consultants Pte Ltd, of the Singapore government, to lead the development of a new GIS-based dynamic master planning tool for the smart urban planning of a new capital city for India’s eighth-largest state, Andhra Pradesh. The tool, or ‘Urban Scenario Planning System’ is based on Urbanetic’s ‘Fabric’ dynamic planning engine and will be among the first in the world to be used by a city administration.
Ultimately covering 218 square km and with a projected day-time population of 5.3 million (3.5 million residents), the city will be a pioneer of smart systems integration, efficiency and quality of life across India and South East Asia.
Faced with a 35 -year project plan, the Andhra Pradesh government recognised that the vast majority of data visualisation and rendering engines currently available lacked the systems architecture, robust data engineering, AI capabilities and basic, practical, applicability required to deliver a truly dynamic master planning tool.
The planning of the new city, to be called Amaravati, had to be approached not as a static and siloed process, but as a fluid and responsive life cycle management platform, simulating performance analysis in 5D: 3D geometry, time and cost, across domains of capacity, sustainability and development feasibility analysis.
(Fabric engine in use for Redpill Group client, Bodø Kommune, Norway)
The fully integrated toolkit would need to seamlessly combine, via theoretically endless design iterations, all basic city and citizen services, including transportation, power, water & waste management, gas distribution, district cooling, safety & security and disaster management – over a five-decade timeframe.
The view of project partners, which include the Singapore government, Foster & Partners and the Guizhou Maritime Silk Road Investment Corporation, is that Fabric is the best of only a few tools currently capable of combining 5D life cycle planning with outcome-driven analytics, addressing interests such as financial modelling, asset management, property management, land management and development control integration.
Building and operating smart cities starts with smart planning and design – with citizens at the heart of the process. With India forecast to become the world’s most populous country within the next seven years, we are delighted to be demonstrating global best practice in a country poised to emerge as a leader in sustainable urban development.