Page 56 - JCAU-6-3

Journal of Chinese

Architecture and Urbanism

ORIGINAL ARTICLE
Data-driven insights into age-friendly smart

community development in China: A case study
of Beijing

Pokai Chuang and Yuan Lai *

Department of Urban Planning, School of Architecture, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China
(This article belongs to the Special Issue: Chinese Cities of Tomorrow: Computing and Prototyping
Intelligent Forms of Future Urbanism)

Abstract

The aging society has prompted a re-evaluation of community development
strategies to better accommodate the needs of older populations. In this context,
the concept of age-friendly smart communities has gained prominence, aiming to
leverage technologies to enhance the quality of life for older residents. This article
summarizes a general concept of an age-friendly community within the framework
of smart city development in China. It then explores residential compounds in Beijing
to investigate their potential for implementing age-friendly smart communities.
Through data description and classification, the spatial distribution and local
characteristics of residential compounds were examined. The results highlight
*Corresponding author: housing compounds with the potential to become age-friendly smart communities,
Yuan Lai based on factors such as building age, population demographics, and typological
(yuanlai@tsinghua.edu.cn) differences reflecting community conditions and surrounding resources. Overall,
Citation: Chuang, P. & Lai, Y. by examining the intersection of the aging population, urban regeneration, and
(2024). Data-driven insights into technology integration, this article contributes to understanding how data-driven
age-friendly smart community insights can shape the evolution of smart communities in an aging society.
development in China: A case
study of Beijing. Journal of Chinese
Architecture and Urbanism, 6(3),
1754. Keywords: Smart communities; Urban informatics; Aging society; Urban planning
https://doi.org/10.36922/jcau.1754
Received: September 4, 2023
Accepted: January 3, 2024 1. Introduction
Published Online: May 27, 2024 The global acceleration in the growth of the aging population has emerged as a
Copyright: © 2024 Author(s). predominant demographic feature worldwide, raising the concerns of aging communities
This is an open-access article in urban areas. According to the World Bank’s 2022 statistics on the total fertility rate
distributed under the terms of the
th
Creative Commons Attribution- for countries and economies, China’s total fertility rate (1.16) ranks 199 out of 208
Non-Commercial 4.0 International countries and regions (The World Bank, 2022). The National Bureau of Statistics of
(CC BY-NC 4.0), which permits all China further reveals that the annual number of births was 9.56 million, with a birth
non-commercial use, distribution,
and reproduction in any medium, rate of 6.77‰, while the death toll reached 10.41 million, indicating a negative natural
provided the original work is growth rate that is increasingly difficult to reverse (National Bureau of Statistics of China,
properly cited. 2023). Meanwhile, China has been actively exploring smart cities and communities in
Publisher’s Note: AccScience both research and practice through policy-driven initiatives, the establishment of new
Publishing remains neutral with development goals, and technological innovations. Cities including Beijing, Shanghai,
regard to jurisdictional claims in
published maps and institutional Guangzhou, and Shenzhen are showing growing interest in the development of smart
affiliations. communities to improve quality of life, social equity, and adaptation to an aging society.

Volume 6 Issue 3 (2024) 1 https://doi.org/10.36922/jcau.1754