World’s smartest city is a tiny German village

TECHNOLOGY/COMMUNITY

Anybody can visit Etteln with the click of a mouse. Nestled in the rolling hills of North Rhine-Westphalia, the German village of Etteln has just 1,750 residents. And yet, the IEEE Smart Cities Contest — the global competition run by the world’s biggest association of tech professionals — recently awarded it the title of the world’s smartest city, ahead of powerhouses such as Hong Kong, Tokyo and Singapore.

This unlikely digital pioneer didn’t achieve global recognition through wealth or top-down tech investments. Instead, Etteln faced down a declining population and the looming closure of its only primary school by taking collective action and doing some homegrown innovation.

The transformation began in 2012, when the school was threatened with closure due to low enrolment. Rather than accept its demise, residents founded Etteln Aktiv, a grassroots citizens’ association and successfully lobbied to keep the school open — setting a precedent that would power the village’s digital renaissance.

One pivotal moment came during covid in 2020. When a fibre-optic rollout excluded 55 households on the village outskirts, the local government balked at the €2.5 million price tag to connect them, though federal funding would have paid for 90% of it. So the villagers took matters into their own hands.

“Sixty-five people volunteered,” recalls Ulrich Ahle, Etteln’s municipal administrator. “Farmers brought tractors, the local rifle club dug the trenches, church members laid the cable. After 3,500 man-hours, we made sure high-speed internet reaches the last milk churn,” he says with a chuckle.

Today, every house and farm is connected with fibre-optic. “We got the clear message: No matter how much effort it takes, everybody will be connected,” says local mill-owner Günter Gordon. Without it, his two sons wouldn’t be able to work from home. “This has only become possible since we got glass fibre.”

More than half the village connects to each other via a Swiss app called Crossiety, which functions as a virtual town hall. There, the city announces events, and locals share news and post classifieds: Mary has a camera to sell, Rudy a backpack; Katharina is looking for a stable for her ducks. “Information spreads much faster with the app,” says Christine Wegner, the project manager for digitalisation in Etteln. “Yet people still meet in person, like before.”

Those without smartphones can connect to digital services at three public touchscreens — say when checking who needs a ride at the digital Mitfahrbank, or “ride-sharing bench”. If a resident doesn’t find a ride, they can borrow EttCar, a shared seven-seat electric Nissan, for free via an app. “The city bought it, and now the soccer club uses it to drive to games,” says Ahle. “The car has been rented over 2,000 times and has driven more than 100,000 kms.” Because every user has to register with their legal name and upload their ID, vandalism hasn’t been an issue, he notes.

“In Etteln itself there is hardly any criticism or doubt, because we included the residents from the beginning,” Wegner emphasises. “All services add value for them, that’s crucial.” And if anybody does express skepticism about an innovation, Wegner says she tries to talk to them directly. “It’s important to calm fear of the unknown and to explain digital solutions in small steps. Sometimes people feel overwhelmed, and that has nothing to do with age.” 

The most impressive project is probably the 3D village, a digital twin of the brick-and-mortar community, displaying weather and environmental data in real time — rainfall levels, temperatures, even the fill level of the local donation bin. The LoRaWAN (Long Range Wide Area Network) supports a network of sensors feeding data to a platform, including the 3D village.

At a glance, Ahle can see that 81 pedestrians and 91 cyclists passed through the village today. Privacy is protected: “We don’t track individuals,” he says. And for one homeowner who didn’t want to appear in the 3D model, the solution was simple: they pixelated the house.

Beyond convenience, this data also supports life-saving planning. One standout innovation is Waterverse, a flood warning system using the open-source, nonprofit FIWARE tools that bring cutting-edge weather information to this modest settlement. Etteln has used its 3D model and rainfall simulations to evaluate the safety of proposed new homes. After recent floods devastated Germany’s Ahr Valley, the results were sobering. 

“We had planned building lots for five new homes,” Ahle says. “But the model showed these would be two metres underwater in a worst-case scenario. We probably won’t allow any houses there.”

The success is as much the result of community effort as it is the savviness of Etteln’s municipal administrator of the past 10 years. Ahle has worked for decades as a top executive in Germany’s digital economy. He founded the FIWARE Foundation and is now managing director of Gaia-X. Yet his deepest commitment may be to his hometown. Under his volunteer guidance, Etteln turned stigma into strategy.

“When developers heard that building sites were still available in Etteln, they said, ‘Too far from Paderborn [a nearby city]. We don’t want to live under a rock,’” he remembers. That’s when Ahle launched a series of workshops to reimagine the village’s future. Out of one of those sessions, in 2017, came the idea to focus on digitalisation.

The turnaround has been profound. All building lots are now taken. The school has nearly doubled its enrolment to more than 80 students. Most importantly, the spirit of civic engagement has only grown.

Even in the face of resistance, as when 26 wind turbines were installed east of the village, permanently altering the village’s backdrop, the community argued but adapted. “There are three reasons it worked,” says Ahle. “First, anyone under 20 was born into this.” The first wind turbine was erected in 1995. “Second, people get used to it. And third, we created a special rate just for Etteln: Electricity is always 30% cheaper than the basic rate.”

Ahle’s next step is to create a blueprint for other cities and villages. “We built a local platform, a digital twin and a strong network. Now, we’re showing others how to do it too,” he says. Today, more than 500 cities worldwide use FIWARE.

The newest innovations include an autonomous drone to support the fire department and health service. Villagers are trained and equipped to conduct simple medical exams that don’t require a doctor at people’s homes, including measuring blood pressure or oxygen saturation. Up to 50 data points are transmitted to the patient’s primary care doctor, who then communicates with the patient via video call.

From the edge of rural Germany, Etteln is offering the world a new matrix for what a smart city can be — one rooted in connection, not just connectivity.

ABOVE Residents can borrow a shared seven-seat electric EttCar for free via an app.

BOTTOM Residents can connect to digital services at public touch screens. Total cost: €100,000, financed through donations and the municipality.

PHOTOS Municipality of Etteln

In Etteln itself there is hardly any criticism or doubt, because we included the residents from the beginning. All services add value for them, that’s crucial.

Christine Wegner

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