Lagos State As An Emerging Smart City Review And Recommendation

Abstract

Over the last several years, the Smart Cities concept has become apparent from the academic world of conferences and workshops to the strategic planning of national governments and primary commercial projects of global IT corporations, multinational infrastructure providers as well as system integrators. Smart city unlike the conventional city is anticipated as a prime city of wellbeing prosperity and productivity. The urge to embrace the smart city concept which is fundamental to sustainable development has been on the rise. In the same vein. Lagos state as an African commercial hub has embarked in her journey to city smartness. The current administration has put various measures and strategies in place to ensure that Lagos state does not lag behind in this "smartness" race. This is evident in some finished and current landable projects already embarked upon as part of her city smartness revolution. These include manger others, the construction of the Eko Atlantic city, activation of toll free emergency services, heritage MOU it signed with Dubai and free Wi-Fi in public parks. This paper evaluated Logos states' accomplishments as an emerging smart city by exploring current working definitions of mary city and a diversity of various conceptual relatives similar to smart city vis-a-vis the present situation of the state. The study recommended strategic measures in conformity with international best practices that can be adopted by Lagos state government to enhance her city smartness.