Sensors across a city measure traffic, air, water and energy, and the city adjusts continuously in response. The gains are real, and the loop has two specific weaknesses worth naming.
The sense-decide-adjust loop, and the two places it goes wrong.
Interactive diagram
Explore the labelled diagram, charts and maps for this topic in full study mode.
Free preview
This is the free notes preview
You're reading the free notes. Aimnova Pro unlocks the full study experience — and you can try it with your first topic free to keep:
- FlashcardsLock in vocabulary and key terms with spaced repetition.
- Practice questionsAnswer exam-style questions and get instant AI marking.
- Mock exams & past-paper vaultSit full mocks and see exactly how examiners award marks.
- Personalised study planA daily plan built around your exam date and weak areas.
Gap one — who it sees
- Sensors count cars and phones
- People walking are largely invisible
- Areas never instrumented never improve
Gap two — who decides
- Adjustments are automatic
- There is no meeting anybody attended
- So there is nothing to object to
Why gap one compounds: The city improves for the people it can measure, which makes their journeys better, which produces more data about them. The people who were not counted at the start are counted even less later.
See how examiners mark answers
Access past paper questions with model answers. Learn exactly what earns marks and what doesn't.
Real-world examples you can name
Decidim, Barcelona's participation platform — launched 2016, open source
A platform where residents propose, debate and vote on city policy, with proposals traceable from submission to decision. Its code is open, so other cities run their own instances.
Who it affected: Residents who would not attend an evening meeting but will use a phone.
Short-term letting platforms and city housing — Barcelona fines from 2016; ban on tourist flats announced for 2028
Platforms let residential flats be rented to visitors nightly. Cities argue this removed homes from the long-term market and pushed rents up; Barcelona has fined platforms for unlicensed listings and announced it will end tourist flat licences entirely.
Who it affected: Residents priced out of central districts, hosts earning from spare rooms, and visitors.
The Colonial Pipeline ransomware attack — May 2021
A ransomware group reached the company's network through a single reused password on an old VPN account. The company shut the pipeline down for several days as a precaution, causing fuel shortages along the US east coast, and paid a ransom of which US authorities later recovered part.
Who it affected: Drivers and airports across the eastern United States.
The other risk: Connected infrastructure is also attackable. The Colonial Pipeline ransomware attack (USA, May 2021) stopped fuel for a large region without anybody reaching a pipe — the connection that makes a system efficient is the same one that makes it reachable.
How this is tested — smart-city sources are common in Papers 2 and 3, and the marks are in who is counted and who decides. It comes up two ways:
Paper 1 — structured question
- Part c: evaluate a smart-city programme
- Part b: explain who a sensor network leaves out
Paper 2 — source-based question
- Q4: synthesise sources on a city technology project
- HL Paper 3: recommend, including how residents can object
The trap: efficiency only: Faster traffic is the easy half. Say who the sensors do not see and where a resident goes to object.
Explain one reason why a smart-city system may not improve life for everybody.
Model answer plan
See the mark-by-mark plan — for / against / judgement, with marking guidance — in study mode.
Recommend two measures to make a smart-city programme more accountable to residents.
Model answer plan
See the mark-by-mark plan — for / against / judgement, with marking guidance — in study mode.