Local authorities are being urged to submit proposals to Whitehall in order to gain £24 million in investment, for turning cities into ‘smart cities’, featuring integrated services such as transport, communications and general infrastructure.

The invest programme titled the Future Cities Demonstrator, is aimed to promote integrated city systems. Local authorities have been given the opportunity to bid for one of twenty £50,000 grants to demonstrate city development proposals.

Universities and Science minister David Willetts said: “Cities face major challenges such as changes in population and demographics, congestion, waste and pressure on resources and services. This underlines the need for our future cities to have high-quality, integrated infrastructure to meet these challenges.”