Urban Digital Twins Domain Working Group

Overview

The Urban Digital Twins DWG provides an open forum for the discussion and presentation of interoperability requirements, use cases, pilots, and implementations of OGC Standards in this domain.

Project Scope

The DWG is dedicated to forging a collective understanding of digital twinning in urban contexts, with the objective of improving the planning, utilization, and policy alignment of urban spaces. This includes addressing critical challenges such as decarbonization and access to green spaces. The DWG focuses on the optimization of urban spaces and infrastructure, considering evolving constraints and requirements. By leveraging Information Technology, the DWG seeks to facilitate the adaptation to changing urban dynamics and enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of space usage over time.

Background

The Urban Digital Twins Domain Working Group (DWG) aims to encapsulate the multifaceted aspects of urban environments, including their physical structure, social and economic functions, and environmental impacts. These digital representations serve to enhance the human geography of cities by facilitating an understanding of how human activities interact with urban landscapes. This interaction encompasses transportation, communication, and utility networks and aims to ensure orderly and optimal urban development. Urban Digital Twins, in this context, are not confined to individual cities; they may encompass entire regions or even continents, especially when addressing broad environmental and climate challenges.

This DWG amalgamates the expertise of previous OGC Working Groups focused on Smart Cities, Energy and Utilities, and Land and Infrastructure. While the Integrated Digital Built Environment (IDBE) Sub Committee and the joint OGC-buildingSMART international Working Group remain distinct, the Urban Digital Twins DWG will also tackle data integration within the built environment. In today’s interconnected society, Urban Digital Twins must not only convey information about cityscapes but also optimize interactions within them, adding a social dimension to the use of space. Therefore, Urban Digital Twins serve to harmonize the physical and virtual realms, supporting community development in areas ranging from infrastructure management, urban planning, and disaster response to augmented reality, smart grids, IoT, facilities management, BIM, and the circular economy.

Activities

The DWG has outlined several activities to advance its objectives. These include comprehending the standards landscape pertinent to Urban Digital Twins and authoring a position paper to contextualize their role within the broader OGC ecosystem. The DWG will also advocate for the adoption of OGC Standards within the Urban Digital Twins community and lead discussions and the formulation of Best Practices specific to Urban Digital Twins. Moreover, the DWG plans to delve into various use cases that intersect with Smart Cities as well as land and energy considerations.

OGC Urban Digital Twins Interoperability Pilot

With over half the global population residing in cities, advances in urban planning and management are crucial for healthier, more sustainable, and more inclusive urban living. The Urban Digital Twins Interoperability Pilot (UDTIP) aims to grow a consortium of organizations that will collaborate to enhance geospatial data interoperability and increase use of geospatial standards within Urban Digital Twins to better meet the needs of urban communities and the organizations that support them.

Visit the Initiative Page to to learn more.

Partners

The DWG collaborates with other OGC working groups including the CityGML SWG, IndoorGML SWG, and SensorThings SWG as well as external organizations such as ISO, IEC SyC Smart Cities, and buildingSMART international.

Contacts

Working Group Chairs: Nick Giannias, (CAE), Hans-Christoph Gruler (Hexagon), Kyoung-Sook Kim (National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science & Technology (AIST)), Carsten Roensdorf (Ordnance Survey), Dimitri Sarafinof (Institut National de l’information geographique et forestiere (IGN – France)), Zubran Solaiman (Bentley Systems)