Urban wheelchair tracking technology, Transport for NSW’s Opal card system and a customisable strata app were among the winners this year’s Smart City Awards.
The Committee for Sydney recognised seven projects working to make the city a more competitive, resilient and liveable global city at its Smart CityAwards last Thursday, 19 September.
Held at Doltone House, Hyde Park, the awards acknowledged projects across eight categories, each contributing to the economic, social, cultural and environmental betterment of Sydney.
The Resilient Sydney Platform, an initiative by the Resilient Sydney Strategy, took out two prizes for its “pioneering” data platform: the Environmental Outcome Initiative award and the pre-eminent Overall Best Smart City Project award. The project relates to a standardised process for measuring and reporting on matters of carbon emissions, water, energy and waste across the Sydney metropolitan area, and supports better place-based decision making, targets and actions.
Wheelchair fitness app Briometrix was recognised with the Best Community Engagement and Social Outcomes Project award for its Navability technology, which records and translates the movement data of wheelchair users. Under a project called City-on-Wheels, this data is designed to be used in future planning for more inclusive cities and consist of information such as terrain steepness, pavement conditions, swapped and power required to navigate urban terrains and more.
Transport for NSW received the award for Best Mobility Outcome Initiative for its contactless transport payment system, Opal, which allows users to “tap on” to public transport using a credit/debit card or other linked device in addition to its dedicated Opal card. The award also recognised the wide reach of the system, being rolled out to all 5200 buses in the fleet.
The Best Data as an Enabler Initiative award was given to the Collaborative Research Centre for Low Carbon Living (CRCLCL) for its Visualisation of Indoor thermal Comfort and Household Energy and Water consumption (VIHEW) tool. Coupled with a platform, this tool captures data on a household’s indoor thermal environmental conditions and electricity and water consumption patterns and interoperates this in real time through a series of IoT meters and sensors. The results are presented through an interactive, user-friendly dashboard that can also be used to adjust settings and control connected devices.
For its network of environmental monitoring devices around Charlestown, Lake Macquarie, the University of Technology Sydney received the Best Place-Making Outcomes Project award.
This project forms a “living lab,” monitoring temperature, humidity, noise and air quality via 50 sensors in community spaces. The data is intended to inform plans for a more liable city, improving public spaces and services, council operations, and form a more digitally engaged community.
The Best Cross Sectoral Collaboration Project award was presented to the Liverpool City Council for its collaboration with entities such as the NSW Farmers Association on the Global Jobs for the Future project.
The award also recognised the council’s ongoing work with the NSW Primary Industries as it predicts what a world-leading agribusiness precinct might look like and how this may provide jobs opportunities for the community.
The final award – Best Emerging Idea Initiative – was received by Strata Alert for its customisable app of the same name, designed to house strata information for property owners and occupants. The Strata Alert app facilitates better communications between parties and eliminates the chances of time and resource duplication with features such as alerts, notifications, messages and groups.
The Smart City Awards were opened with a keynote presentation by Dr Larry Marshall, the chief executive of CSIRO, and winners were decided by a panel of judges including Lucy Hughes Turnbull AO, chief commissioner of the Greater Sydney Commission, the Hon Kevin Anderson MP, minister for better regulation and innovation, Adam Beck, executive director of the Smart Cities Council Australia New Zealand, and Dorte Ekelund, principal advisor on Smart Cities for SMEC and the chair of the Committee for Sydney’s Smart Cities taskforce.
Full list of awards:
Best Community Engagement and Social Outcomes Project
City-on-Wheels from Briometrix
Environmental Outcome Initiative award
Resilient Sydney Platform
Best Mobility Outcome Initiative
Contactless Transport Payments by Transport for NSW
Best Data as an enabler Initiative
VIHEW Tool by CRC for Low Carbon Living
Best Place-Making Outcomes Project
Urban Liveability in Charlestown from The University of Technology Sydney
Best Cross Sectoral Collaboration Project
Global Jobs for the Future by Liverpool City Council
Best Emerging Idea Initiative
Strata Alert
Overall Best Smart City Project
Resilient Sydney Platform