Deutsche Telekom’s smart city plan includes the deployment of connected street lights and smart waste containers
Deutsche Telekom and the municipal government of Bonn have kicked off a program to deploy smart city initiatives across the German city.
Under the smart city program, Deutsche Telekom will connect street lights in the city center of Bonn and waste containers at Münsterplatz garage with intelligent sensors via NarrowBand-IoT (NB-IoT) technologies. The solution makes the street lights dimmable and motion detectors enable the street lights to darken or brighten themselves automatically. Furthermore, the local public utility receives a proactive notification in case one of the bulbs fails and must be replaced. “This technology saves up to 60% of the operating costs”, said Anette Bronder, head of digital and security department of Deutsche Telekom. The sensors inside the waste containers at Münsterplatz garage measure the filling level so the waste management of Bonn doesn’t have to set out until the containers are actually full.
Deutsche Telekom also provided a software and data for the measurement of air quality in Bonn. The installed sensor is located on one of the street lights near the Münsterplatz garage. In regular intervals, diverse data are provided, the telco said.
In September, Deutsche Telekom announced it was working with the city government of Bonn to implement a smart parking initiative in the city.
The telco said its Park and Joy app will enable drivers to get an overview of available parking spots in downtown Bonn and pay for them direct from their cell phones.
The pilot project is scheduled to start in 2018. By the end of 2019, a large proportion of the city center’s managed parking spaces are to be networked, so that drivers can reach their destinations faster and more conveniently, Deutsche Telekom said.
In the following phase, multi-story car parks and private parking spaces are to be integrated into the network as well and the smart city solution expanded to include connections to public transportation. The meshed network will allow drivers to advance book parking spots in gated areas such as multi-story car parks. Deutsche Telekom also highlighted that the solution will help alleviate traffic congestion in the inner city and reduce emissions.
Deutsche Telekom has already installed smart City solutions in seventeen European cities in ten countries.
