That 34% of the inhabitants of Greater Concepción must walk more than 30 minutes to access a health center, that 21% of its population will be made up of elderly people by the year 2030, or that a significant percentage of coastal towns will suffer floods in their territories as a result of climate change in the next 25 years, are some of the data analyzed by the City Lab Biobío as part of microstudies developed in 2024 to put urban issues on the table and that seek to answer the central question that guided the research and technologies developed in the laboratory during this year.

Anticipating the impact that 75 urban projects will have on the Costanera sector, even before they begin to be executed, was another of the areas developed thanks to the CityScope platform, which uses the city’s own data to model future scenarios. Visualizing traffic and accidents in San Pedro de la Paz in specific time periods, and building the first digital twin for a port city in Latin America are the main milestones that City Lab Biobío adds during 2024.

Data and progress that were presented by the laboratory team, together with Corporación Ciudades, and that accurately summarize the achievements highlighted at a national and international level, also adding to the other laboratories of the MIT City Science network.

The Principal Director of City Lab Biobío, Fernando Pérez, also delved into the challenges of 2025, such as studying the territory where Huachipato is located, contributing information and analysis of traffic in San Pedro de la Paz, the publication of new microstudies, and, above all, the realization of the MIT City Science Summit Biobío 2025. “It will be a great meeting of city laboratories that will be attended by more than 150 researchers from around the world, who will not only nourish us during those days with their vision about urban issues, but we will also be working for eight months with those laboratories of the network on different urban challenges of Greater Concepción,” the architect announced.

Alfredo Echavarría Figueroa, president Cámara Chilena de la Construcción

“If today it is difficult to build, planning is even more difficult, so the City Lab Biobío opens up remarkable opportunities in this area. In addition, it allows for the simulation of scenarios, so the type of cities that are being built can be shown to people in advance, always thinking about the quality of life of its inhabitants.”

Patricio Donoso Tagle,
Board President Corporación CIudades

“One of the contributions that City Lab Biobío can make is the coordination between different institutions, whether public or private. This is not an easy task, because there is a lot of information that is not necessarily in the same language, and what City Lab does is put everything in the same language to facilitate the conversation between actors, which is fundamental.”

Rodrigo Díaz Wörner,
Governor, Región del Biobío

“Applied intelligence as a result of a public-private agreement is something that does not exist in Chile, and it is happening in Biobío. The great challenge for next year will be to persevere in what is being done and to advance in inputs to have a good metropolitan regulatory plan for Greater Concepción.”