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Improving Firenze Control Room
Published on 26 June 2019
Italy
Toscana
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About this good practice
There is currently a control room in the city of Florence, which uses well-tested and already active instruments for traffic control and public lighting, with traffic light synchronization systems, with traffic control with sensors and cameras, mobility control electricity and car & bike sharing, public lighting monitoring and its consumption.
The comparison with international experiences (including those of the Empower project), the participation in dedicated European projects, have led the Municipality of Florence towards creation of a control room that receives the data and interfaces with more situations and in a wider area, multiplying its effectiveness.
In the new Control Room, all the functions will be transferred to the company that already takes care of the 'smart' part of the city, it will act automatically taking the decisions and reorganizing. The Control Room will monitor traffic, gas, water and electricity services, public lighting, traffic light systems, waste bins, the ZTL and parking . A part is already started with the mobility dashboard: the detection of the transit of vehicles, the level of waste bins, information on air quality, are monitored by sensors and converge in a software that reads these data in an integrated manner. All this will serve as a basis for managing the SCCR .The main stakeholders and beneficiaries are the municipalities of the Florentine metropolitan area, the technicians and the energy manager, the citizens.
The comparison with international experiences (including those of the Empower project), the participation in dedicated European projects, have led the Municipality of Florence towards creation of a control room that receives the data and interfaces with more situations and in a wider area, multiplying its effectiveness.
In the new Control Room, all the functions will be transferred to the company that already takes care of the 'smart' part of the city, it will act automatically taking the decisions and reorganizing. The Control Room will monitor traffic, gas, water and electricity services, public lighting, traffic light systems, waste bins, the ZTL and parking . A part is already started with the mobility dashboard: the detection of the transit of vehicles, the level of waste bins, information on air quality, are monitored by sensors and converge in a software that reads these data in an integrated manner. All this will serve as a basis for managing the SCCR .The main stakeholders and beneficiaries are the municipalities of the Florentine metropolitan area, the technicians and the energy manager, the citizens.
Resources needed
The New Florence Smart City Control Room will be realized with an investment of 3.2 million euros, coming from European funding deriving from the H2020 SCC1 Replicate project and from the ERDF funds of the Florence Metro NOP. The Control Room will be built on the first floor of the Silfi headquarter
Evidence of success
The ongoing experience of the Silfi Control room is already providing a huge and useful amount of data about traffic and public lighting, including energy consumptions, environmental data on air quality and weather. Two large screens already show all the monitored activities in an office of the Major in Palazzo Vecchio: many decisions can already be taken in real time, and all the municipalities of the metropolitan area of Florence have joined the project.
Potential for learning or transfer
On the issue of control rooms and monitoring systems there is a vast and varied development in many European countries. With the Empower project we were able to appreciate many interesting experiences: above all that of the city of Santander, in Spain, which we in fact invited for an exchange in Florence. The exchange was interesting and fruitful, and the cooperation promoted by Interreg proved very useful. Each nation has its own specific activities: in our case, for example, Florence has remodeled the sensors for waste bins, because those in Santander (which had also been tested in our city) were not suitable for us. Anyway the Florence Control Room has learned much from the experiences of other cities: not only Santander, also Rennes, Saint Sulpice, La Forete, Magdeburg, Bristol, San Sebastian, Nilufer, Essen and Lausanne. We believe that the development of the smart city control room in Florence can enrich other experiences, thanks to its specific features.
Further information
Website
Good practice owner
Organisation
Metropolitan Area of Firenze
Italy
Toscana
Contact
Project Manager