"Digital transformation can only succeed together"

For Elisabeth Kaiser, Parliamentary State Secretary at the Federal Ministry of Housing, Urban Development and Construction, the Smart Cities model projects are a successful model. "The benefits are noticeable, and the snowball effect is working," she said in her keynote speech at the Smart Country Convention. 73 model projects with more than 650 measures have been launched, almost 200 of which have been developed cooperatively, and many of the pioneering ideas are now also being used by other municipalities. After all, everyone faces similar challenges, such as climate change and mobility issues.

"The model project is having an impact and reaches all village and city sizes and all regions nationwide," says Kaiser. As an example, she cited one from Süderbrarup in Schleswig-Holstein. The platform for municipal spaces faciliates to centrally book community centres, club venues, but also materials and equipment for events. The idea has already been adopted by other municipalities. In Bochum, urban climate monitoring enables the resource-efficient collection of climate data by setting up a mobile network of environmental sensors.

Supporting the municipalities

According to Kaiser, the “Smart Cities and Municipalities Strategic Plan” is intended to drive forward the digitalization of urban and regional development and support municipalities in the implementation of digital solutions through the structural and framework conditions - “for coordinated action at all federal levels”, said the State Secretary. With a competence center and networked consulting services as well as a marketplace for digital applications, know-how is to be bundled.

The digitalization of the construction value chain, with all its social challenges such as housing shortages, climate protection and a lack of skilled workers, is also a joint task. Building Information Modeling, or BIM for short, for software-based networked planning, construction and management of buildings plays a central role here. “The successful digital transformation can only be achieved through joint action by the federal government, federal states, local authorities and everyone else involved in construction,” said Kaiser.