INVESTIGATING ACTORS AND PERCEPTIONS IN THE CONCEPT OF SMART CITY: THE CASE OF HAMBURG

---

Tezin Türü: Yüksek Lisans

Tezin Yürütüldüğü Kurum: Orta Doğu Teknik Üniversitesi, Mimarlık Fakültesi, Kentsel Tasarım, Türkiye

Tezin Onay Tarihi: 2019

Tezin Dili: İngilizce

Öğrenci: MERT CAN YILMAZ

Danışman: Zübeyde Müge Akkar Ercan

Özet:

The technology generates a quiet revolution across the fields of science and engineering, not to mention urban and computational studies. Day by day, authorities and corporations launch various Smart City projects and strategies. Whether it sounds terrifying or not, anyone has a digital footprint in the physical and virtual environment through the Internet of Things devices and smart appliances which emerge nearly anywhere in cities, including software applications which we voluntarily welcome on our smartphones or computers. Smart cities, therefore, are proclaimed as both inevitable and the future. This thesis combines theoretical and empirical research on the digital-oriented understanding of the physical environment and data-driven urban practices in academics and practices. The study reviews scholarly and grey literature to provide state-of-the-art knowledge in the subject, evaluates development and deployment of Smart City services in the City of Hamburg by analyses and semi-structured in-depth interviews to provide recommendations both to the concept and the City, captures the interrelations of different actors by actor-network theory to reflect their emphasis on social, political and spatial fields. The analyses result in the furcated division in the identification of smart cities. Numerous actors contribute and supplement to this fundamental dichotomy resulting cities as well as individuals to suffer. Additionally, engineers and data scientists detained this very urban domain in academia due to the neglect and lack of knowledge of planning- and design-related disciplines. Moreover, the City exhibits various yet disorganised strategies, projects, initiatives and institutions for its Smart City vision. Conclusively, the analyses and recommendations serve to recapture the unique role of urban planners and architects in guiding the future of cities.