Summit explores growing cities of the future

Civic leaders watching to see how high- tech infrastructure will spur investment, innovation

For Kansas City, Mo., Mayor Sly James, Google’s announcement that it was choosing his city for its ultra- high- speed fibre network was like winning the civic lottery.

Only this is a win that will continue to pay dividends long after the initial investment in Kansas City, Mo. and Kansas City, Kan. — the two cities chosen as the recipients of the Google Fiber project.

The pilot project is for an ultra- high- speed broadband network that promises to deliver Internet speeds of one gigabit per second, up to 100 times faster than most people are accustomed to.

It’s a development being closely watched by civic leaders. And in February, James will join Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson and other civic leaders, entrepreneurs, technology innovators and investors to share the story of his city and its digital future at The Cities Summit conference.

The ultra- high- speed network is expected to open up a world of opportunity — and we’re not talking better video- game playing here.

For cities like Kansas City, Mo., the network will propel its entire economy forward, drawing investment from companies that want to grow and innovate in an environment that offers leading- edge infrastructure.

“Kansas City, Mo., takes a great deal of pride in being a city of entrepreneurs. A lot of entrepreneurs built the city,” said James, citing such companies as Hallmark and the giant Kauffman Foundation that is devoted to entrepreneurship. “Now, with Google, it is attracting different types of entrepreneurs to the city in terms of information technology and that whole knowledge industry.”

James said the ultra- highspeed connections — which will wire everything from government centres to community centres, county hospitals and other facilities — will transform the delivery of services. It could be anything from a school nurse being able to use video to connect to physicians to analyze a medical problem, to virtual town- hall meetings.

“Our technology in city government is at least 10 years old, this is going to step us up considerably,” said James.

Kansas City, Mo., takes a great deal of pride in being a city of entrepreneurs. A lot of entrepreneurs built the city.

SLY JAMES

KANSAS CITY, MO. MAYOR

Organized by the Vancouver Economic Commission, the Cities Summit conference is bringing together city builders of all backgrounds who will be looking to an urban future in which the globe’s cities will grow by more than two billion people by 2030, adding to the three billion people living in cities now.

Milo Medin, Google vicepresident, access services, who is overseeing Google’s Gigabit Fiber to the Home project, will also be speaking at the conference, which runs Feb. 1 and 2 at the Vancouver Convention Centre.

For more details about the conference go to: vancouver citiessummit. org.