Smart city: Gardanne is testing the global (multi) performance market

Transform the city, but also its budget structure. This is the ambition of the smart city project in which the newly elected municipality of Gardanne (Bouches-du-Rhône) is committed in 2021, in the words of Hamid Djounidi, director of its development SEM (Semag). Which underlines the "delays in terms of city equipment and the weight of the payroll - 75% - in its operating section, leaving no room for maneuver".

With the help of a multidisciplinary team from AMO, Semag, the City's agent, opted for a global public performance contract (MPGP), which was awarded last October to the Citétech group (agent) /Valmont/TEM. This contract covers a mission to design, build, operate and maintain a multi-service network integrating all urban facilities and municipal buildings. In particular, it will aim to "improve the comfort and service to citizens and users, the quality of public facilities and spaces" or even to "optimize the management of urban services on the perimeters of mobility, housing, environment, security", details the award notification. It all takes two years for the works – which started this month – then ten for operation and maintenance, with budgets of €35 and €5 million respectively.

The contract includes an award criterion dedicated to “urban comfort”

While MPGPs are traditionally very focused on energy performance, this is not the case here. "This dimension is however underlying the services provided", nuance Hamid Djounidi. And the operator is committed to a reduction of at least 45% in the annual carbon footprint per inhabitant.

Streamline services. The contract also stands out in that it is designed as an element of rationalization and transformation of the administration. Thus, the offers were separated in particular according to a criterion of “effectiveness of the public service”, weighted at 10% and corresponding to performance objectives. For the contractor, it is a question of "generating new uses which will make it possible to rationalize services, simplify processes and enrich and open up public data", explains the director of Semag, adding that the municipal agents affected by these developments will be supported in the transformation of their businesses.

Another originality - even a first in France, according to the legal AMO -, an award criterion devoted to "urban comfort", for 10% of the score. A goal of creating at least 10 new public conviviality spaces has been set. The idea being to support “the municipal trajectory of development of inter and intragenerational exchanges”, indicates the specifications. Each space must be "smart", i.e. equipped with artificial intelligence terminals, connected street furniture, video surveillance cameras, etc.