Amsterdam is just not the ‘smartest city’ in Europe
Amsterdam can call itself the second smartest city in Europe, after London and ahead of Berlin and Paris. This is the conclusion reached by Swedish real estate company ProptechOS. That assessed one hundred major European and American cities on eleven smart city characteristics.
The characteristics that the researchers assess relate to the technological infrastructure and connectivity, green (sustainable) infrastructure and the labor market for techies. Examples are the available internet speed, the number of tech jobs per ten thousand inhabitants and access to charging points for electric cars. For each city, the assessment leads to an index figure, with a maximum of 100 points.
London
With a total of almost 74 points, London is the crown. Broken down by category, Londoners scored 89 points on tech infrastructure, 95 on green infrastructure and 36 on the tech job market. Amsterdam’s overall score was almost 67 points. 86 for the technical infrastructure, 88 for the green infrastructure and 27 for the labor market.
The researchers on that European cities generally score less well than American cities. The Texan city of Austin tops the list (over 75 points), followed by LA (over 74), London (almost 74) and Seattle (over 73). Amsterdam is in sixteenth place on this list.
Rankings appear more often in which Amsterdam, Utrecht and/or Eindhoven score high on smart city characteristics. Each study uses its own variable lists, the lists are subjective.