This website was archived as of November 4, 2021. In Fall 2021, City Tech launched two new, independent organizations and announced open-source resources for direct resident engagement. Click here to read the announcement.
Blog Post
City Tech Launches New Organization to Drive Public Value from Urban Infrastructure
City Tech Collaborative • Oct 13, 2021
Civic Infrastructure Collaborative Will Work with Asset Owners, Operators, Technology Providers, Public Officials, and Residents to Develop Practical, Place-Based Infrastructure Solutions
Chicago
– City Tech Collaborative (City Tech) is channeling deep industry partnerships and a proven innovation methodology into a new nonprofit organization to drive public value from core urban infrastructure. The new Civic Infrastructure Collaborative will bring together physical, digital, and social resources to help cities thrive.
Cities and their residents are demanding more than ever of urban infrastructure. Far from being isolated and inanimate objects, urban buildings, roads, parks, bridges, transportation facilities, and utility infrastructure make up complex systems that must connect with each other and the people who depend on them. Infrastructure plays a key role in achieving public, social, economic, and environmental goals. But making the most of urban infrastructure requires novel approaches, business models, and partnerships – especially in light of evolving technologies and constituent expectations.
Civic Infrastructure Collaborative will work with asset owners, operators, technology providers, public officials, and residents to develop and implement place-based infrastructure solutions. The organization will harness important trends like digitization, network connectivity, urban systems integration, and adaptive reuse to identify new roles that urban infrastructure assets can play and new sources of value for the communities they serve.
The Civic Infrastructure Collaborative brings together infrastructure and technology experts as well as widely recognized civic innovation leaders. City Tech’s Director of Strategic Partnerships Jamie Ponce will be the organization’s Executive Director, with City Tech’s Manager of Solution Development Tom McCoy as Director of Infrastructure Solutions. City Tech’s Executive Director Brenna Berman will serve as Board Chair, joined on the Board of Directors by Rick West, CEO of Millennium Parking Garages, LLC.
“Infrastructure investment is on the tip of everyone’s tongues right now, but what’s missing from too many conversations is a recognition that 21st century infrastructure must address more diverse needs and constituents than ever before,” says Jamie Ponce, Civic Infrastructure Collaborative’s Executive Director. “We need to think deliberately, creatively, and collaboratively about the role of urban infrastructure in modern cities and how technology can create far-reaching value.”
Millennium Garages in downtown Chicago (www.MillenniumGarages.com) will be the anchor facility for Civic Infrastructure Collaborative’s first projects. As a publicly owned, privately operated asset spanning 3.8 million square feet, the garages are the largest underground public parking system in the United States. With leadership and support from the City of Chicago and global infrastructure investment firms Northleaf Capital and AMP Capital, the facility connects residents, commuters, and tourists with Chicago’s central business district, cultural destinations, Lake Michigan’s waterfront, highway networks and public transit, and the Chicago Pedway through a network of four garages.
According to Millennium Garages’ CEO Rick West, “I am proud to work with Civic Infrastructure Collaborative on building solutions that deliver value to the City of Chicago, Millennium Garages’ investors, and the public. This new organization is helping our asset to realize a long-term strategy to stay relevant and productive for many years to come.”
The launch of Civic Infrastructure Collaborative builds on City Tech’s track record of urban solution development. Since its founding in 2015, City Tech has completed more than 30 projects and solution development collaborations to make cities happier, healthier, and more productive. City Tech has prevented flooding using smart green infrastructure, enabled dynamic management of city curbs, averted utility damage in underground utilities, and facilitated COVID-19 recovery in shared urban spaces. In 2020, City Tech launched the Millennium Gateway Innovation Lab
to embed parking more fully into transportation systems, to facilitate smart infrastructure management, and to cultivate high-value services and space uses to ensure continued relevance and productivity of parking facilities.
Civic Infrastructure Collaborative is one of several new efforts by City Tech to address industry-specific challenges in the rapidly evolving smart cities arena. City Tech has also announced the launch of SWITCH (Sustainable Wellness through Innovation, Technology, & Collaborative Health), an organization focused on improving health and wellness in historically underserved communities, as well as the open sourcing of City Tech’s resident engagement program
on public-facing technology and design.
To learn more about Civic Infrastructure Collaborative, please visit www.InfrastructureForward.org.
For more information about City Tech Collaborative, please visit www.CityTech.org.
About Civic Infrastructure Collaborative
Civic Infrastructure Collaborative drives public value from core urban infrastructure through cross-sector collaboration and technology-enabled innovation. As a nonprofit 501(c)3 organization, the Collaborative uses a proven methodology to identify, develop, deploy, and scale inclusive infrastructure solutions. We help infrastructure asset owners, operators, public officials, technology providers, and other stakeholders to deliver economic, social, and environmental returns for the communities they serve.
About City Tech Collaborative (City Tech)
City Tech is an urban solutions accelerator that tackles problems too big for any single sector or organization to solve alone. City Tech’s work uses IoT sensing networks, advanced analytics, and urban design to create scalable, market ready solutions. Current initiatives address mobility, healthy cities, connected infrastructure, and emerging growth opportunities. City Tech was born and raised in Chicago, and every city is a potential partner.
Chicago, USA
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