Al-Ahliyya Amman University holds a workshop in collaboration with the Arab Forum for Smart Cities

Al-Ahliyya Amman University, in collaboration with the Arab Forum for Smart Cities, held a workshop entitled Turning Jordanian cities into smart cities - reality and ambition with the participation of the Greater Amman Municipality and a number of Jordanian municipalities, the Ministry of Digital Economy and Entrepreneurship, Int@j, in addition to competent experts and academics, under the auspices of Professor Dr. Sari Hamdan, President of Al-Ahliyya Amman University, at the Mahmoud Darwish Auditorium.In his speech, Professor Dr. Sari Hamdan welcomed the audience, expressed the importance of smart cities and their role in improving the level of life and keeping pace with developments with the change in human needs and touched on a number of studies related to smart cities, and stressed the importance of partnership between the public and private sectors. Hamdan stressed that the workshop's recommendations stem from partnership between various academic sectors, experts and specialists. He also stressed that the recommendations of the workshop stem from many of the university's aspirations to contribute locally and regionally to the topic of smart cities and Mr. Dr. Hamdan stressed that the orientations of the students’ dissertations and the research of the staff members in the subject contribute to providing traffic solutions to decision makers in Jordan.For his part, The Dean of the Faculty of Engineering, Professor Dr. Mutassim Abdul Jaber, said that Al-Ahliyya Amman University is the leading and first in the region to embrace the only program specialized in smart transport systems that aims to provide the community with a variety of expertise. Professor Dr. Abdul Jaber pointed out that the university has allocated more than $1 million for the purposes of creating a group of engineers in the field of intelligent transport and establishing a research group in participation with prestigious universities such as Imperial London College Virginia Tech and locally with the University of Jordan, and the University of Cairo. He stressed that the holding of this workshop is the beginning of fruitful cooperation between the Arab Forum for Smart Cities and Al-Ahliyya Amman University to help researchers, specialists and graduate students complete their research and studies and the possibility of applying them on the ground. Samira Dahiat, Executive Director of the Arab Forum for Smart Cities, said the workshop comes from the objectives of the Arab Forum for Smart Cities towards activating public-private partnership and strengthening partnerships to regulate the role of science, technology and innovation in achieving sustainable development.Al Dahiyat also pointed out that this workshop is the first fruitful joint cooperation in a series of scientific workshops on the subject of smart cities and opening up prospects for joint cooperation in promoting knowledge that serves municipalities and cities in the fields of intelligent electronic transformation through conferences, courses, workshops and joint events related to this aspect.This was followed by the exchange of commemorative shields between the two parties and the honoring of the participants.The workshop included five presentations by Eng. Nidal Al Bitar, CEO of Int@j, Mr. Sultan Al Kharabsha, Executive Director of the Directorate of Information and Communication Technology in Greater Amman Municipality, Engineer Hind Al Hyari, Director of the Rapid Bus Operation Department, as well as a presentation from the Arab Forum for Smart Cities and a presentation from the Engineering Research Group for Smart Transport Systems at Al-Ahliyya Amman University presented by Dr. Taqwa Al Hadidi.Furthermore, Eng. Yanal Al Hares who is a student of graduate studies gave a presentation that included his dissertation in the Master of Smart Transport Systems entitled “The use of smart parking systems in the parking lots of Al-Ahliyya Amman University”, followed by a dialogue session between attendees and participants.The presentations were followed by a panel discussion that has produced a set of recommendations, the most important of which is to overcome the difficulties facing researchers and the importance of partnerships between all sectors in order to provide effective solutions to the challenges that exist to turn cities into smart cities.