4 minute read

Anthony Tugman
E534
9/7/20
Assignment 1

America is an incredibly diverse community, a vast pool of individuals from various backgrounds, experiences, and beliefs striving towards the elusive American dream. In stark contrast, the cities of America are one in the same. Not in the sense of architecture, food, and culture but rather in the way that they are run. Policy makers always seem to be playing “catch up” whether it be in reacting to environmental disasters, managing services for ever shifting populations, or even attempting to respond to crime. What if our cities were smarter? Imagine being alerted in real time to hotspots of pollution, being able to visualize traffic patterns throughout the day, and being able to identify large gatherings calling for an increase in police presence. By implementing big data and analytics into our cities this, and more, is possible.

By definition a smart city is “an urban area that uses different types of electronic sensors to collect data” [1]1. This data is then analyzed and insights gained from the analysis are used to manage the city more efficiently, or to recognize patterns that would not be realized by typical human observation. This application relies on big data although physical in nature at its heart. What I mean by this is that the sensors themselves are physical, and a wide variety must be used to truly understand what is occurring in the environment. The data itself is a side effect of the sensors, but this is where the heart of the benefit is held. With the technology readily available, and the potential benefit from the investment of deployment unlimited, it is surprising to me that we do not see such systems deployed across cities around the world. One such project, The Array of Things, has slowly been implemented across parts of Chicago over the last four years.

The Array of Things is self described as an experimental urban measurement project comprising a network of interactive, modular devices, to collect real-time data on the city’s environment, infrastructure, and activity [2]2. With the goal of providing this data to the public as well as various engineers, policy makers, and residents, The Array of Things now features a network of 150 sensor locations strategically placed across the city [2]2. It is important to note that the creators of this project claim this to be an experiment, which answers my earlier question of why more cities do not follow suit. It seems that many issues arise from collecting such data including integrity, privacy, and usability. This seems to be a common concern across all areas of big data and finding solutions to these concerns will make individuals use the technology more often. If The Array of Things is able to ultimately solve the above problems, I do not see why this technology would not be a template for applying across the world.

Although the hardware behind the nodes is fascinating, it is more applicable to focus on the data they produce for the scope of this course. At the current iteration the devices collect information on pollution, traffic, and other ambient information. The collected information is publicly available and the team behind The Array of things has done its best to mitigate privacy concerns.

In reflection, I believe that The Array of Things has immense potential to become life changing in the way our cities are managed. However, this does not come without its downfalls. The way collected data is currently being published is not appropriate for the target audience. In fact, it seems that an advanced degree would be required to make sense of any of the data. For The Array of Things to gain the public’s trust as well as be used by various industries it must become more user friendly. For widespread adoption I propose the information be available in two forms. Firstly in a way that the technically inclined can analyze the data in ways the creators did not imagine possible. Second, the data should be available in an easy to digest, visual format that the common man can decipher. In any case, I see The Array of Things as the forefront of implementing big data into cities around the world and will continue to monitor updates to the project in hopes of sifting through the data myself one day and informing policy decision with my results.

  1. “Smart city” Wikipedia, 11-Sep-2020. [Online]. Available: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smart_city. [Accessed: 12-Sep-2020]. ↩︎

  2. Array of Things. [Online]. Available: https://arrayofthings.github.io/index.html. [Accessed: 12-Sep-2020]. ↩︎