This is a web platform for analysing the accessibility of public facilities that makes it possible to assess if Barcelona complies with the provision of services or facilities of the so-called 15-minute city model.
It makes it possible to see, for example, the coverage on foot of metro stops before and after the opening of the future lines L8 and L9 or the network of libraries before and after the last one was built.
The urban digital twins make it possible to make predictions, to test what effect the implementation of certain projects may have or what the impact of the deployment of certain public policies may be.
In this first phase of the project, which is now to be extended, BSC technicians have worked in collaboration with the Municipal Institute of Informatics (IMI) and Barcelona Regional (BR) as the main expert using the Digital twin for urban planning.
Barcelona City Council and the Barcelona Supercomputing Center - Centro Nacional de Supercomputación (BSC-CNS) have presented on Wednesday the first results of a collaboration carried out in the framework of a digital twins programme for cities. This is a web platform for analysing the accessibility of public facilities that allows an assessment of whether Barcelona complies with the provision of services or facilities of the so-called 15-minute cities model.
The platform is the result of the first phase of an ambitious project in which BSC researchers have worked in collaboration with the Municipal Institute of Informatics (IMI) and Barcelona Regional (BR). It is a proof of concept that will serve as a starting point for more elaborate analyses. Through the creation of urban digital twins, simulations will be carried out with the ultimate goal of optimising the design of public policies.
Cities are a set of highly complex systems. The aim of the development of this digital twin of the city of proximity has been to approach the understanding of the urban phenomenon by analysing data, evaluating resources, understanding the accessibility of services and working with models that are a simplification of this complexity in an attempt to make it comprehensible. Models make it possible to work with hypotheses, generate scenarios and visualise multiple variables or combinations of variables that can be crucial when making decisions.
Digital twins (DT) are very powerful tools for digitally testing different proposals and extracting information to help decide which public policies or projects may be more efficient in achieving the desired objectives. They are very useful for making many hypotheses, building various scenarios, making predictions and tests of what impact the implementation of certain projects may have or what the impact of the deployment of certain policies may be.
What sets DTs apart from previous approaches to data analysis and visualisation is that they allow data from multiple sources to be integrated in real time and future scenarios to be evaluated by means of complex simulations. The development of these tools allows for more efficient resource management.
Pre-testing the different options for solving a problem on digital twins can anticipate results and save conflicts. They are, therefore, a tool that in the future should help, in this case, Barcelona City Council, to make the right decisions to improve the quality of life of citizens.
Specifically, the work on the development of a digital twin for urban planning carried out in this first phase has made it possible to reproduce the city of proximity in a digital model. This has made it possible to see, for example, the coverage within a 10-minute walk of metro stops, before and after the opening of the future L8 and L9 lines; the network of libraries before and after the last one was built, the Gabriel García Márquez Library in Sant Martí de Provençals, electric recharging points, Bicing stations, health facilities and the distribution of green spaces in the city.
New, more ambitious phase to develop a digital twin tool
Once this first phase has been developed, BSC and the City Council plan to develop a more complex, more robust digital twin project with more interrelated data in order to approach, with greater certainty, solutions and decisions that improve the lives of citizens. The aim is to develop a digital twin tool that can be used by any city that may be interested in the future.
In this second phase, which could have a first operational version with some of the systems within 2 to 4 years, BSC would assume the technological and construction leadership of the Digital Twin, taking advantage of the experience acquired through its participation in a project aimed at providing Digital Twin solutions for cities. Barcelona City Council would be the potential data provider. Barcelona Regional (BR) will take on the role of customer, as an expert using the digital twin for urban planning and aware of the complexity of urban planning and city management within this ecosystem. Finally, the Barcelona Municipal Institute of Informatics (IMI) would assume its coordination and possible collaborations with other cities.
This second phase is part of the collaboration framework between Barcelona, Bologna, BSC, the Inter-University Consortium CINECA, and the University of Bologna. All of them signed an agreement to develop an evidence-based public policy model through the construction and development of urban digital twins with the aim of improving public policies in both cities.
- Image of the website showing accessibility to Barcelona's hospitals. Yellow shows the areas of Barcelona that have a hospital within a 15-minute walk.
- It also shows examples of accessibility in the library network, with an emphasis on the new Gabriel García Márquez Library.
- And the extension of the metro network, with Line 9 and the extension of FGC's L8.
