The City of Syracuse is just weeks away from activating its street light sensors. The city has spent more than two years installing 17,000 smart connected LED street lights, but is still testing . This project was largely meant to help ice and snow removal in the winter. Director of Strategic Initiatives Jen Tifft said this new data will help the city in a variety of ways.
“Whether it be able to route certain snow cloud more excessively. Maybe we do pre-treating for streets that we know are going to be more icier than others. This data actually does have a lot of uses that we are looking to identity year-round and so that could be related to how and when we pickup trash in certain area. We know we have a problem currently with the breeze.”
Tifft said air quality monitors could come into play when construction in the I-81 replacement project begins. Syracuse recently won the International Data Corporation’s North American Smart Cities Award for Sustainable Infrastructure for converting the streetlights to LED. Tifft said this along with the implementation of the sensors could make Syracuse more desirable for investors.
“It does give us some additional proof points around the validity. And that might make us more competitive for grants but it certainty also puts us on the radar at a national radar for potential partnerships with national organizations, technology firms, and others that are looking to pilot new technology with city partners.”
Right now, the city has 10 road temperature sensors and four air monitors placed in strategic locations and will put them into action as soon as they get accurate and frequent data from them.