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● Former public health and urban planner● Focused on health inequity research and policy
implementation● Mos tly involved in des igning data frameworks
for measuring community health populations and impacts of city infras tructure on health
● Worked las t 7 years in API s ector as writer, analys t and s tra tegic consultant including with smart cities bodies , public transport, mobility, non-profits and enterpris es
About me...
City Government APIs: Where are we and where to go?
State of City APIs
City examples across Europe
Use Cases
Open Data
Smart Cities
Urban Health
Low hanging fruit…?
Growth
Internal governance
API discoverability
Ecosystem partnerships
Met hodolog y
● Online research
● Attendance at smart cities conferences
● Regular interviews with key city decision-makers and civic tech startups
City Examples
Antwerp, Belgium
https:/ / acpaas.digipolis.be/nl/ home
Antwerp, Belgium Because menu heading is English Google Translate doesn’t recognize rest of page needs translation
The engines are available for all platforms (citizens, OCMW, local police, companies, employees, etc.) of our customers and are accessible via RESTful APIs.
Early stages: providing APIs to speed up product development for city services
Barcelona, Spain
http:/ / opendata-ajuntament.barcelona.cat/data/en/dataset?res_format=JSON
http:/ / opendata-ajuntament.barcelona.cat/en/visualitzacions-i-aplicacions
https:/ /www.decidim.barcelona/api/ docs
Barcelona, Spain
7 APIs listed in open data portal but 357 other datasets available via CKAN API34 map service APIsGoal to make data a common good
Dev portal integrated into open data catalogVery basic tutorial, but does have showcase to inspire ideas
Civic engagement project of the city does have an API but it is not listed and no demos example widgets to embed polls into other community group websites
Berlin, Germany
http:/ / fbinter.stadt-berlin.de/ fb/ index.jsp
Berlin, Germany Web mapping Service APIs available (good place to start)
Eindhoven, The Netherlands
https:/ / data.eindhoven.nl/ pages/home/
Eindhoven, The Netherlands
Examples of real-time visualization
APIs via OpenDataSoft platform that makes open datasets available as APIs
No connection with the cities IoT living lab sensor data
Manchester, UK
https:/ / portal.bt-hypercat.com/
Manchester, UK
https:/ / portal.bt-hypercat.com/
Acts like a developer portal with getting started guides, example use cases, onboarding, etc
No data APIs that link sensors/infrastructure maps to demographics, places of interest, city services
City Government APIs: Key themes
● Build it and they will come mentality
● No real engagement with community groups
● No links to state, national or other open APIs
● APIs as addendum to open data catalogs
● APIs for sensor data not linked to open data catalogs
● Hidden APIs or APIs from scraped data
Use Cases
● Open 311● Trans port
● Open Data● Smart Cities
Use Cases
● Urban Health
● Civic engagement● Planning/ place-
making
Open 311
Open 3117 German cities2 Finnish cities1 Greek city1 UK city
1 Spanish and 1 Portuguese city in development
TransparencyCivic engagementCity services as a platform
Open Dat a
● Limited number of API-enabled datasets● Limited tooling for how to make use of open APIs for
various audiences/segments● Improving in some jurisdictions but some cities have
been burnt by low engagement● Still going to hackathons: wifi and toilet maps● Misses the whole API as service integrator angle, eg.
planning & CAD APIs, financial accounting APIs
Sm art Cit ies
● Inverse care law being repeated● Lack of community education, eg. asthma groups,
childcare and runners groups: do they know how to use air quality APIs? Or infrastructure APIs?
● Unexpected disruption without APIs: city bike rental schemes aren’t optimized so dockless bikes grow
● No socioeconomic mapping over Open311
Urban Healt h
Liquor licensing mapping with noise/open311/amenity
Food security mapping with population and fresh food outlets
Where To Next?
W here t o f rom here?
PositionInternal governanceprocesses
PromoteEnsure discoverability
Reduce departmental barriers
Inspire usage
Deliver services
PartnerEducate stakeholders
Encourage ecosystem
Track usage
Align exist ing processes and open
Requires further research and design of a process to guide cities to implement APIsRequires research into calculating value (and potential to reduce inequity) to cities, citizens, local business, community groups
Governance
Discoverab il it y
● 12 identified strategies to aid government API discoverability
● Tracking resources/ tools available to support cities to implement, any ecosystem providers who can support cities, and examples of cities that are doing this
● Limited examples at present, esp in Europe
https://github.com/mgboydcom/City-API-Discoverability/wiki
Ecosyst em part nersh ips
● Cities notorious for not responding to contact requests
● Open311 and socioeconomic index: “Great idea, bye!”
● Hackathons < Incubators● Educating community groups and
connecting them with developers/ startups
● No proven methodology as yet for this
