City of Darwin representatives recently returned from a fact finding trip to Taipei, confident of the significant investment being made in smart technologies.
Attending the Taipei Smart City Expo and Summit with councils from across Australia and around the world, General Manager Innovation, Growth and Development Services, Josh Sattler, and Deputy Lord Mayor, Jimmy Bouhoris, experienced first-hand how advances and innovation in artificial intelligence technology and virtual applications can improve the delivery of services to communities.
Eighty-four councils from across Australia were represented at the event.
Sattler, said, “This trip confirmed that City of Darwin is at the forefront of smart cities technology implementation and platform integration globally.
“We are recognised by our neighbours to the north as an important partner to collaborate with.
“We have been rolling out new smart technologies across Darwin since 2018 and a number of significant projects are nearing completion, including a new smart lighting system across Darwin that will be flexible, energy efficient and save money.
“As a capital city with a small population it is easier for us to be nimble and implement innovative new technologies quickly.
“City of Darwin is committed to investigating technologies to improve our service delivery and enhance the lives of our community.”
Some of the innovative and cooperative applications of artificial intelligence presented at the Expo included:
Safety applications – the introduction of virtual fencing utilising CCTV, where areas of the city can be ‘fenced off’ and alarms activated if that fence is breached.
Call handling applications – where members of the community identify issues e.g. overflowing rubbish bins, emergency situations, and send through a geo-located video that identifies the type of issue, location and which service provider should action.
Mobility applications – where analytical data such as people movement, can be used to inform urban design and transport routes.
City of Darwin was the only Australian representative successfully nominated to a position on the strategic committee for the GoSmart organisation, with a membership that includes the deputy mayor of Taipei, commissioner for Great Britain and several key industry partners. GoSmart is at the forefront of smart technology development
and implementation.
