Survey of smart city initiatives towards urbanization

The smart city concept is a recent phenomenon that seems to be drawing so much attention from both academia and industry. With a rapid and alarming influx of migrants into urban areas the service delivery, traffic congestion to and fro the city, air pollution, crime rate, energy crisis (load shedding), standard of living has become a burning issue for both city managers and management. This event has triggered the need for smart cities initiates as a solution to remedy the situation. Although a number of pilot projects seem to be showing sustainability and great success in Europe, Asia and United states, similar projects (initiatives) need to be carried out or tested particularly in developing countries. This paper provides a survey into smart cities initiatives towards urbanization challenges. Open issues and challenges are discussed, and then the impact of smart cities on science, technology and society are highlighted.