This century is set to be the century of the city. Ever-increasing urbanisation is proceeding against a backdrop of advances in digital technologies and data availability and analysis, which are having profound effects on the ways that the future of cities is unfolding. Emerging from this intersection of urban growth and 'big data' is the discipline of urban science which can assist governments, industry and citizens to move beyond imperfect understanding and use data to undertake tasks such as optimising operations (e.g. service delivery, traffic flow), monitoring the condition of infrastructure (e.g. bridge conditions, water leaks), planning new, more efficient, infrastructure (e.g. public transport, utilities provision), responding to abnormal conditions (e.g. hazard detection, emergency management), developing new and effective policies (e.g. road pricing, energy efficient buildings), enhancing economic performance and, informing and communicating with citizens to improve quality of life.
This Centre for Doctoral Training (CDT) is designed to play a leading role in the emergence and development of urban science. It will establish urban science as a field of study and focus of scientific inquiry. This new field needs trained cross-disciplinary researchers, who have the skills to integrate diverse branches of knowledge to address a range of important current and future policy drivers. It will build capacity within the UK HE sector to deliver novel solutions in the urban science domain, both nationally and internationally. Importantly, it will do so in an interdisciplinary environment, e.g. by exploiting synergies between computer science, engineering, mathematics and social science. Solutions to urban issues require a tri-partied relationship between academia, public bodies and the private sector. This CDT will work alongside government agencies and industry partners in the UK and abroad. The importance of urban science and appropriate cross-disciplinary research is central to our CDT approach. The potential benefits and impact are listed by the leader of Birmingham City Council as including "mak[ing] a real difference to tens of thousands of Birmingham residents", "saving £Ms in operating costs", and "deliver[ing] a legacy of change through the training of individuals who have real expertise in their area". The deputy mayor of New York states that the centre can "develop scientific solutions that will have direct impact on billions of the world's population."
This CDT provides a UK training environment that is part of a wider international programme, which offers training alongside international city experts, and benefits from the support of leading industry practitioners. No one in the world is tackling urban challenges at this scale. By leading the research agenda on the science of cities, educating the next generation of experts in how to apply that research, bringing innovative ideas to a world market, and creating new, fast-growing industry solutions and the many jobs that go with them, this UK-led CDT will be at the centre of the global stage in this field.
The CDT will adopt a 1+3 (MSc+PhD) training model that is high-quality and rigourous, to produce multiple cohorts of successful, highly-employable graduates. It promotes an international student experience; students will work alongside a larger student cohort from NYU, CUNY, Carnegie Mellon University, University of Toronto and IIT Mumbai; it allows our students unprecedented access, in the UK and overseas, to existing city operations, to utilize existing and newly emerging data streams, and to explore and deploy novel urban sensors; it enables students to work alongside industry luminaries, leaders in public service and citizens, to understand, measure and improve urban systems; and it provides value for money to the UK through 50+ PhDs who will receive discipline-defining training from world-class institutions.
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