Construction Magazine November 2018 | Page 109

EUROPE
CLICK TO WATCH : STREET REBOOT2 HIGHLIGHTS — STARA ’ S BIG DATA CHALLENGE
109 a functional and smart city . Ilpo Laitinen , Head of Stara Administration , argues that this accessible data has not only made the city more transparent but it has also helped to foster citizen engagement .
“ Through the open data project , one of the data sets that you can access is the city ’ s decision-making data which helps to make this an increasingly transparent process ,” he explains . “ At the same time , Helsinki also wanted to create an open source services platform whereby companies , SMEs and even residents can work together to develop our own services . We are at that stage where we are now developing our services and engaging citizens to be a part of the process .”
By creating participation engagement programmes and making residents a part of this journey , the Nordic capital isn ’ t implementing technology for technology ’ s sake but rather is implementing digitally-savvy public services which are community based . “ Our coders follow certain codes of conduct and guidelines , to ensure that they ’ re making services based on citizens ’
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