TEHRAN – The Iranian Space Agency (ISA) supports development of space-based city services, ISA official Ali Taherzadeh said in a press release on Sunday.

He called ground- and space-based infrastructures in the field of city services, information and transport as the main principles for development in this area.

ISA aims to expand public utility services nationwide and to develop its ecosystem for space-based city services, he said.

Recognition of national spatial and satellite database potentials to establish spatial database for city information, which is accessible for citizens as well as providing private and public services through the city are amongst the main aims of ISA, he said.

The development in quality and speed of city services is high on agenda by many of mayors and their advisors to solve urban problems, he said.

On the other side, connection and information infrastructures has a great development with the help of technology, which leads to increase in the quality of living in the cities, he said.

He pointed to the formation of smart cities in past decades as a global approach.

In smart cities, connection and city services are developed, urban transport and pollution are controlled, the quality of urban environment is increased, he said.

Smart cities characteristics 

According to the Internet of the Things Agenda website a smart city is a municipality that uses information and communication technologies to increase operational efficiency, share information with the public and improve both the quality of government services and citizens welfare.

Emerging trends such as automation, machine learning and the internet of things (IoT) are driving smart city adoption.

In the transportation arena, smart traffic management is used to keep track of and analyze traffic flows to optimize streetlights to prevent roadways from becoming too congested based on time of day or rush-hour schedules.

SB/MQ/MG