HSLU launches Smart Region Central Switzerland initiative

Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts (HSLU) has launched the Smart Region Central Switzerland initiative. According to a press release, this aims to facilitate digital and data-based work on complex issues that have an impact on Central Switzerland. The core element of the initiative is the Smart Region Lab, which is housed at the Department of Computer Science on HSLU’s Rotkreuz campus. It offers interactive data tables where several users can jointly present, combine and vary data of all kinds.

Using what are known as RegionScopes, for example, allows data linked to mobility flows, energy networks and economic areas, in addition to social data, to be displayed as part of a three-dimensional representation of Central Switzerland, while developments can also be simulated and variations tried out.

The tables have already been used in a first pilot project for tourism in Central Switzerland. The project initiators evaluated representative guest data and movement patterns before and during the pandemic and discussed them with representatives from the tourism sector and tourism-related businesses. With the help of the tables, tourism officers were able to simulate a range of different scenarios in addition to developing new ideas and offers.

In conjunction with the CityScienceLab of HafenCity University Hamburg, HSLU developed mobile versions of the data tables as well. “We are quite literally bringing different stakeholders together around a table where current situations can be illustrated, future developments and possible solutions can be derived, and decisions can be made in a participatory manner”, comments Ulrike Sturm, Head of the Smart Region Lab, in the press release.