Development of the city assessment technique by the criteria of a “smart” city[Развитие Методики Оценки Города По Критериям «Умного» Города]

Currently, the phrase “smart city” is applied to the essence of the city very often — this is the reaction of society, which has realized the importance of the quality of urban capital, through the evaluation of indicators of productivity, communication density, “mobility” and “flexibility” of the city. The pluralism of approaches to definition of a “smart city” remains the main problem, why it is difficult to apply the phrase “smart city” to the concept and characteristics of cities, which has led to the lack of an adequate methodology for measuring the “smartness” of the city and, as a result, the impossibility of high-quality and timely decision-making of city management. The method of comparison and grouping is used to analyze approaches to the definition of a “smart” city. As a result, the main shortcomings of approaches to the definition are identified and the author’s approach to the definition of a “smart” city as a complex organizational system for human development in the framework of creating an environmentally, socio-economically and information-technologically safe environment is formulated. Also, a comparative analysis of the advantages and disadvantages of existing methods for evaluating the city according to the criteria of a “smart” city was conducted, as a result of which the author proved the need to revise the methods, which will identify the most pressing problems of city development and develop effective methods for solving them. The author proposed and tested an integral approach to the assessment of a “smart” city, which allows analyzing trends in urban development in retrospect. The proposed assessment methodology is based on 6 smart city criteria, which are evaluated based on 63 indicators that are statistically available in the Russian Federation. The results obtained during the testing of the proposed methodology will allow comparing cities with different populations, identifying “gaps” and factors that contribute to the differentiation of cities according to the criteria of a “smart” city.