The Internet of Things is a term that refers to technology that enables devices to connect to each other, a network or other types of integration. Everything from thermostats to traffic lights can share its data and operate dynamically with IoT advances.
Consider your mobile phone or tablet. Once these devices gained connectivity, their functionality and data access increased substantially. Applying this technology to your city’s infrastructure gives you an excellent way to improve residents’ quality of life. Here are a few ways local governments are already using IoT for this purpose.
Multipurpose Street Lights
Barcelona, Spain took traditional street lights and turned them high-tech. They swapped their old bulbs out for energy-efficient LEDs, added sensors capable of tracking air quality and set the lights to turn on when pedestrians walk by.
Tackling Traffic Problems
Gridlocked city streets are a common sight in Los Angeles, and the city deployed IoT sensors and cameras to begin addressing the problem. Once they gathered enough data to identify common congestion causes, they put together a traffic plan that reduced delays by 12 percent.
Chicago’s Array of Things
Chicago has fully embraced the power of the Internet of Things, putting together a smart city system that they call the “Array of Things.” The city deployed sensors in many areas for data collection and monitoring purposes. This information is available to the local government, research facilities and the public for projects that improve the city’s quality of life.
California’s Smart Water Management
The drought caused many problems in California, and several local governments are banking on IoT being the way to lessen the impact of shortages in the future. This wireless irrigation tool allows farmers to improve the efficiency of their water usage, reducing the overall waste. They put probes and wireless towers in optimal data collection locations in the fields for real-time information.
The Internet of Things is a highly versatile and flexible technology that has the potential to transform your city’s infrastructure completely. Just think about what you could accomplish with new insights gathered from sensors in previously inaccessible places, and the connected devices required to analyze it all. The future will be a promising one for a forward-thinking local government.
