Strategic Foresight and Planning

Investing in foresight capabilities enables cities to anticipate potential challenges and plan their responses more effectively (Unsplash)

With the complex and emergent interactions that occur within a city, leveraging foresight techniques, big data and modelling tools to inform long-term planning can help city planners pre-empt possible futures and address associated urban challenges through a more evidence-based lens. Strategic foresight uses future-oriented concepts to anticipate opportunities and challenges, helping cities to prepare for change. Through techniques like horizon scanning, trend analysis, and scenario planning, strategic foresight generates insights that enhance policymaking and expand options for decision-makers to address various possible futures. 

Global challenges like COVID-19 and climate change highlight the critical need for cities to develop flexible land use and infrastructure strategies. Densely populated Singapore has also benefited from data analytics and geospatial technologies to support planning analysis, enabling a deeper understanding of urban issues to make informed decisions in planning for land use, amenities and infrastructure. For instance, public transport data, including crowd level data, have proven useful in forecasting peak travel periods and determining strategies to address congestion issues—such as incentivising off-peak travel or enhancing Singapore’s transport infrastructure.  

On the front of climate change, agencies in Singapore have been adopting smart planning tools such as the Integrated Environmental Modeller. This tool optimises thermal comfort through planning and design, for example by harnessing existing wind corridors to create a more comfortable living environment. The use of digital twins and other modelling and simulation tools have also been deployed to better anticipate challenges and simulate possible outcomes so that planners can sharpen planning and design interventions.