Justification of the proposed topics and research questions for 3-paper PHD

JUSTIFICATION OF THE PROPOSED TOPICS AND RESEARCH QUESTIONS FOR 3-PAPER PHD By [Student's Name] Course Professor Institution City and State Date Introduction Smart city initiatives have developed into advanced solutions for the challenges brought about by the urbanization of cities, sustainable development, and technological integration. With the use of advanced technologies, their objectives are to improve living in urban areas, ensure efficiency in governance, and address social inequalities. In many instances, however, promising smart city projects usually suffer due to a lack of knowledge among the general public or citizens, exclusiveness in some aspects, and even raised concerns about privacy and equity. The proposed topics of this PhD-three-paper project, Smart Transport, Smart Policing, and Smart Health Initiatives, are chosen in a way that would respond to these challenges in performance, public perception, and social inclusiveness. Therefore, this paper justifies the proposed research questions for each topic and, based on the literature review, highlights gaps existing in the knowledge within those fields and justification for further research. Assessing the Effectiveness and Public Perception of Smart Transport Initiatives: Evaluating Environmental Benefits, Social Equity, and Demographic Influences on Accessibility 1. What are the main features of smart transport initiatives that influence their effectiveness? Peng, Nunes and Zheng (2017) establish that success and, therefore, the effectiveness of any smart transport initiative is underpinned by public awareness; a lack of better understanding of the technologies at one's disposal undermines its utilisation and effectiveness. Primary aspects that will contribute to efficiency will include ease of interface, real-time information, and overall coordination with existing transport structures. Vaithilingam et al. (2021) argue that public education campaigns are necessary to improve awareness of these features; however, there is a limited investigation of how such implementation would be affected. The existing frameworks also lack an assessment of how these features improve the system's performance. This indicates a gap in understanding how to optimise smart transport technologies through better awareness strategies, thus justifying further research in this area. 2. How do residents perceive the environmental and social benefits of Smart Transport technologies? Being an emission-reduction enabler, smart transport contributes to minimal environmental degradation while providing improved mobility. Asl, Nie and Charkh (2024) proved that intelligent traffic management and eco-driving can lower the rate of greenhouse gas emissions by a significant margin while ensuring better transportation efficiency. This is their finding in general; however, they showed a deficiency in their system scalability and integrative functionality across different urban setups. Moreover, the adoption of intelligent transport solutions across varied levels of technological readiness in other regions is not well explored and thus clearly shows a justification for research on localised implementation strategies. Debnath et al. (2014) add another layer to the environmental degradation discourse by showing that even as urban smart systems have reduced congestion and improved air quality, there is a lack of standard benchmarks that can help compare environmental impacts across regions. The absence of such broad frameworks to assess the success of intelligent transport systems provides a strong justification for developing robust indicators of long-term sustainability outcomes. The social equity issue regarding transport infrastructure is also underrepresented in the literature. Cuthill et al. (2019) mentioned that public transport investment could reduce socio-economic disparities due to improved access to jobs and education. Yet, they indicate that these gains accrue very unevenly, especially among marginalised populations. The study emphasises how transportation solutions must be made to suit the needs of disparate demographic groups, especially those underserved. 3. How do demographic factors such as age, income, and familiarity with technology affect perceived accessibility of Smart Transport technologies? Minimal research has been conducted on how demographic factors like income, age, and technological familiarity affect transport accessibility. Asl, Nie and Charkh (2024) indicated that light and heavy smart transportation systems are accessible to different levels based on demographic profiles. However, few studies have investigated how these factors interact with technology adoption. Understanding these interactions is crucial to the design of equitable systems serving diverse urban populations. Furthermore, Debnath et al. (2014) identify a lack of nuanced metrics for evaluating the influence of demographic variables on the success of smart transport systems, particularly in the context of the urban-rural divide. Their findings indicate that demographic-centric policies may significantly increase the inclusiveness of those systems but require further empirical validation. Evaluating the Effectiveness of Smart Policing Initiatives: Examining Features, Crime Reduction Impact, and Resident Safety Perceptions in Urban Areas 1. What are the main features of smart policing initiatives that influence their effectiveness? The potential of smart policing initiatives to improve urban safety is immense, integrating new technologies like IoT, AI, and big data analytics into crime prevention (Delgado and Castro-Toledo, 2020). Although the functionalities of smart policing technologies are widely recognised, limited research has been done into what features are most important to their success. Bokhari and SeungHwan (2022) emphasise that effective smart policing relies on a tight connection between governance structures and advanced technologies. However, they have identified a continuing disconnect between these elements that is reducing the effectiveness of such initiatives a...