A lightly edited Google Translate machine translation of “‘Evolving’ Cities, ‘Renewed’ Living” follows below:
“Evolving” Cities, “Renewed” Living (People’s Commentary) 城市“进化”，生活“向新”（人民时评）
Li Junqiang 李君强 （People’s Daily editor 责编, journalist 记者, author 作者 )
People’s Daily, December 1, 2025, p. 05《人民日报》（2025年12月01日 第 05 版）
Using digitalization as the “blood vessels” and “nervous system,” we activate the perception, judgment, and collaborative capacities of the city as an organic living entity, achieving not only the coexistence and mutual prosperity of “people, city, environment, and industry,” but also a profound reshaping of the logic of urban development.
以数字化为“血脉”与“神经”，激活城市有机生命体的感知、判断、协同能力，实现的不仅是“人、城、境、业”的共生共荣，更是对城市发展逻辑的深度重塑
Intelligent lighting systems adjust brightness based on pedestrian flow, vehicle traffic, and natural light, saving energy and electricity. Integrated sensors monitor air quality, noise, temperature, and humidity in real time. A system to care for the elderly living alone addresses worries about seniors lacking care… The future appearance of Smart Cities can be glimpsed through these innovative applications.
智能照明系统根据人流量、车流量和自然光线调节亮度、节能省电，集成传感器实时监测空气质量、噪声、温度、湿度等，独居老人关怀系统解决老人无人照料的烦恼……未来智慧城市建成什么模样，透过这些创新应用，可见一斑。
The Recommendations for the 15th Five-Year Plan propose “building innovative, livable, beautiful, resilient, civilized, and intelligent modernized people’s cities.” Five ministries, led by the National Development and Reform Commission, jointly issued the Action Plan on Deepening Smart City Development and Advancing All-Domain Digitalized Transformation, calling for the full use of data to empower urban economic and social development. Cities are the comprehensive carriers for advancing Digital China. From top-level design to specific practices, the more Smart Cities “evolve,” the more urban life “renews.”
“十五五”规划建议提出：“建设创新、宜居、美丽、韧性、文明、智慧的现代化人民城市。”国家发展改革委等5部门联合印发《深化智慧城市发展 推进全域数字化转型行动计划》，要求充分发挥数据赋能城市经济社会发展作用。城市是推进数字中国建设的综合载体，从顶层设计到具体实践，智慧城市越“进化”，百姓生活越“向新”。1
In recent years, our country has achieved remarkable results in the development of Smart Cities. Urban data infrastructure has been steadily strengthened, data application scenarios have become increasingly diverse, and the digitalized transformation ecosystem continues to improve. Using digitalization as the “blood vessels” and “nervous system,” the perception, judgment, and collaboration capabilities of the urban organism are activated, achieving not only the symbiotic prosperity of “people, city, environment, and industry,” but also a profound reshaping of the logic of urban development.
近年来，我国智慧城市发展取得显著成果。城市数据底座日渐夯实，数据应用场景日益丰富，数字化转型生态持续优化……以数字化为“血脉”与“神经”，激活城市有机生命体的感知、判断、协同能力，实现的不仅是“人、城、境、业”的共生共荣，更是对城市发展逻辑的深度重塑。
“Smart” improves efficiency and advances the upgrading of urban governance. Shanghai is implementing “One Network, Unified Management,” Hangzhou in Zhejiang is building a “City Brain,” and Xiong’an New Area in Hebei is constructing a “Digital Twin City”… Smart City construction helps achieve facility connectivity, data integration, platform interoperability, and business integration. Operating on “one network” and governing with a “unified approach” has significantly improved the level of urban management and service capabilities.
“智慧”提升效率，推动城市治理升级。上海推行“一网统管”、浙江杭州打造“城市大脑”、河北雄安新区建设“数字孪生城市”……智慧城市建设，助力实现设施联通、数据融通、平台互通、业务贯通。“一张网”运行、“一盘棋”治理，大大提升了城市管理水平和服务能力。
The principle underlying “smart” is serving the people and making cities more humane. The public has the most say in whether Smart City construction is successful. Lixia District in Jinan, Shandong Province, has established a smart elderly care system, creating electronic health records for over 30,000 elderly people and building a new model of smart elderly care; Ningbo, Zhejiang Province, has built an “AI+medical” intelligent ecosystem, significantly reducing the average wait time for patients. Focusing on urgent public needs and expanding Smart City application scenarios can continuously enhance people’s sense of gain, happiness, and security.
“智慧”的底色是为民，让城市更具温度。智慧城市建设得好不好，群众最有发言权。山东济南历下区建立智慧养老系统，为3万多名老人建立电子健康档案，打造智慧养老新业态；浙江宁波构建“AI+医疗”智能生态系统，患者线下就诊平均耗时大大缩短。聚焦群众急难愁盼问题，拓展智慧城市的应用场景，能持续提升人民群众的获得感、幸福感、安全感。
Looking ahead, deepening Smart City development requires concentrated effort in three areas.
面向未来，深化智慧城市发展，可从3个方面下功夫。
First, all-domain transformation is the direction of travel. Government services are shifting from “one task” to “multiple tasks.” Urban operations are moving from “single scenarios” to “multiple scenarios.” Smart City construction is shifting from single-point construction to systemic coordinated transformation. Seizing this opportunity to move ahead, advancing city digitalized transformation across all domains, strengthening support to transformation across all aspects, and optimizing the transformation ecosystem across all processes will enhance the intelligentization and precision of city governance and inject powerful momentum into advancing the construction of modernized people’s cities.
全域转型是方向。政务服务从“一件事”到“多件事”，城市运行从“一个场景”到“多个场景”，智慧城市建设正从单点建设向系统协同转变。乘势而上，全领域推进城市数字化转型，全方位增强转型支撑，全过程优化转型生态，提升城市治理智能化、精细化水平，能为推进现代化人民城市建设注入强大动力。
Second, reform and innovation are essential levers. Many localities still lack coordination mechanisms for Smart City construction and face issues such as inconsistent data standards and incompatible data interfaces. “Data islands” remain a persistent problem. Some intelligentized scenarios do not match public needs and applications perform poorly. To clear bottlenecks and obstacles in digitalized transformation, deepen appropriate digitalized reforms, strengthen cross-department, cross-level, and cross-regional planning and coordination while encouraging and supporting every city to adapt to local conditions and explore differentiated paths to All-Domain Digitalized Transformation.
改革创新是抓手。不少地方在智慧城市建设方面缺乏协调联动机制，面临数据标准不统一、数据接口不兼容等问题，“数据孤岛”现象仍然存在。有的智能化场景与公众需求不匹配，应用效果不佳。破除数字化转型的堵点卡点，还需深化适数化改革，既强调跨部门、跨层级、跨区域统筹协调，又注重鼓励和支持各城市因地制宜，差异化探索全域数字化转型之路。
Third, security assurance is the bedrock. Information and data have become new elements of city governance. While they provide convenience, they also bring new challenges, data security, algorithmic bias, and privacy protection all require institutional responses. Smart City construction must not pursue only fast data flows and precise computation; it must also maintain the bottom line of security, clarifying responsibilities and boundaries for data collection, storage, usage, and sharing.
安全保障是基座。信息和数据作为城市治理的新要素，在提供便利的同时也带来新的挑战，数据安全、算法偏见、隐私保护等问题都需要制度来回应。智慧城市建设不能只追求数据跑得快、算得准，更要守住安全底线，明确收集、存储、使用、共享等各个环节的权责边界。
The “evolution” of Smart Cities is not only a technical question but also a process of updating governance concepts, improving institutional systems, and reshaping the relationship between people and cities. As we enter the new stage of Whole-of-City Digitalized Transformation, and leverage Digital Power to advance urban High Quality Development, the promising vision of a new path to urban modernization with Chinese characteristics is highly anticipated.
智慧城市的“进化”，既是技术命题，更是治理理念更新、制度体系完善和人与城市关系重塑的过程。开启城市全域数字化转型的新阶段，以数字之力推动城市高质量发展，中国特色城市现代化新路子通向的美好图景令人期待。
Footnote
- 全域 is an abbreviated form of 全领域. “Urban All-Domain Digitalized Transformation” is the literal translation of “城市全域数字化转型.” The best contextual translation is “Whole-of-City Digitalized Transformation.” ↩︎