Transforming Urban Life: Evaluating İzmit's Journey towards a Smart City Future

The increasing preference for urban centres as living spaces has led to heightened population density in these areas, thereby amplifying the need for Smart City Systems to help cities manage these challenges effectively. In this context, İzmit, as one of Türkiye's prominent smart cities, stands out due to its innovative applications in research, industry, and technology. The aim of this study is to empirically evaluate İzmit, the central city of Kocaeli Province, based on Cohen's smart city characteristics across six primary dimensions (smart people, smart environment, smart living, smart governance, smart mobility, and smart economy) and their associated sub-criteria. The research employs the analytical hierarchy process and best-worst method to compare İzmit against these smart city criteria. The findings highlight the significance of smart city applications in facilitating human life and urban management, providing practical implications for local authorities. Accordingly, İzmit has made significant progress in its smart city initiatives; however, it also faces certain challenges. Concrete solution proposals have been presented for these issues, emphasising the necessity for the design of sustainable, human-centred strategies that align with community needs, ultimately pointing to the need for advancing more sophisticated smart city applications.