Firms Demonstrate ‘Smart Infrastructure’ Tech in Downtown St. Louis
Date Posted: June 19, 2018
Posted In: Ideas,
From St. Louis Post-Dispatch: What if streetlights could detect a car accident and send a message to travelers to avoid the intersection?
Two startups operating in St. Louis say it could be a possibility with a new technology they demonstrated Monday night that allowed electric vehicles to connect through a wireless system built into some city streetlights on Market Street.
The developers, Labyrinth Technologies and Electric Cab of North America, say it could be important step in building the sort of infrastructure that would make for a smart city: a utopian vision in which a city equips infrastructure with information-processing technology to improve efficiency and modernize the way it tackles problems.
For a few minutes Monday, a computer in an electric car parked near Market and 10th streets displayed in real time the speed and turn signals of a second electric car driving up and down the street.
The cars transmitted data to one another through the streetlights, part of a a $4 million Downtown STL Inc. project to brand downtown and improve public safety by installing more than 2,000 curved, colorful light strips with “smart technology” downtown.
About 135 of those lights have been installed on Market Street from the Arch grounds to Union Station. They’re programmed to change color via a “secure wireless network smart technology,” to which officials hope to add other applications, like gunshot detection software.