An intelligent agent for exploring Valencia City Council's: open data

Access to municipal open data is key to transparency, citizen participation and informed decision-making. However, in many cases, this data remains difficult for most citizens to consult due to its volume, format or technical complexity. With the aim of reducing these barriers, a new use case has been developed within the Citcom.ai project: an intelligent agent that allows users to explore Valencia City Council's open data using natural language.

This use case has been developed based on the idea put forward by Vicent Muñoz Correcher in his Master’s thesis as part of the University of Valencia’s in-house Master’s degree in Advanced and Applied Artificial Intelligence (IA3), under the supervision of Professor Joan Vila Francés, who is also a member of our research team at the IDAL (Intelligent Data Analysis Laboratory) at the same university and is involved in the aforementioned European project.

Following the development work carried out by our research team, this new tool has been created, which aims to offer a new way of interacting with public data, one that is much more accessible and intuitive for non-technical users.

Making public data understandable through AI

The tool is presented as a web application that allows anyone to ask questions directly in natural language — for example, about mobility, urban services or municipal indicators — and obtain comprehensible answers without needing to know in advance which dataset to consult or how to analyse it. To do this, the system combines semantic search techniques with large language models, enabling it to automatically identify the most relevant datasets, generate interactive visualisations and provide clear and concise interpretative summaries.

This approach represents a significant change from traditional open data portals, where users must manually navigate extensive catalogues and work with complex formats. Thanks to the intelligent agent, the process is simplified and transformed into a guided experience, closer to a conversation than a technical query. This significantly reduces the barrier to entry for the use of public data, encouraging its reuse by citizens, municipal technicians, researchers and policy makers alike.

The value of the system lies not only in the occasional consultation of information, but also in its potential as a tool to support data-driven decision-making. By facilitating the exploration and understanding of municipal data, the agent contributes to more informed public management and greater citizen involvement in urban affairs, fully aligning with the principles of a smart city.

Overall, this use case demonstrates how Artificial Intelligence can play a key role in the democratisation of open data, transforming large volumes of information into accessible and useful knowledge. It is a first step towards more transparent, participatory models of interaction aimed at strengthening the relationship between public administration and citizens.

Here’s a video showing the tool in action!

If you are interested in the potential of this tool and would like to apply a similar analysis to better understand the needs or problems of your city or organisation, please contact us!

The authors would like to thank the Regional Ministry of Innovation, Industry, Trade and Tourism (Conselleria d'Innovació, Indústria, Comerç i Turisme de la Generalitat Valenciana) for its funding under Grant Agreement No. 101100728, as part of the European Commission’s Citcom.ai project.