IoT apps and analytics to automate Brooklyn life

Brooklyn is New York’s first borough to set up the Neighborhood Innovation Lab in Brownsville with the help of private-public partnerships. Brooklyn residents will now benefit from the wonders of IoT applications and analytics to live a better, more connected life. This is not a premiere; San Diego, Chicago, Sydney, Sweden, and India are only a few of the regions that have implemented smart technology to improve public transportation, pollution levels or traffic.

“New York is a city of neighborhoods and there is no better way to prepare communities for the future than by empowering residents to define their needs and help our shape technology investments,” Mayor de Blasio said in a release. “Neighborhood Innovation Labs provide a unique opportunity to strengthen our collaboration with community, and also open new doors for local residents to learn about careers in technology, a fast-growing sector of our economy.”

IoT adoption would make public services cheaper and more reliable, according to a Deloitte report. Based on information collected in real time by IoT sensors, officials can make accurate predictions to improve traffic. Sensors are inexpensive and can be implemented for numerous city services to “describe, predict, and exploit relationships among phenomena.”

The price drop in accelerometers has made sensors cheaper, yet it has also made them “robust enough to create information from everything from fetal heartbeats to conductive fabric in the mother’s clothing to jet engines roaring at 35,000 feet,” says the report. Automation through IoT sensors can lead to vital improvements in tourism, industrial activities, healthcare and security failure detection, maintenance of medical devices, fire and gas leak prevention, plus much more.

The city of New York will sponsor the lab for $250,000 annually and, if results are positive and on track, the city will create labs in the other boroughs as well. In June, the goal is to install solar powered benches with cell phone charging and LinkNYC kiosks with free public Wi-Fi and a tablet to access online services like maps.

The Neighborhood Innovation Lab is not a recent project. The idea was presented to then-President Obama who promoted it to encourage innovation and as part of the Smart Cities Initiative in 2015.

“Rapid technological advances hold the potential to transform our cities, driving quality of life improvements for millions of New Yorkers,” said Miguel Gamiño, Chief Technology Officer for the City of New York. “Our challenge — and responsibility — is to ensure these technologies reach and benefit all New Yorkers, not merely a select few. Neighborhood Innovation Labs represent an important step toward fulfilling Mayor de Blasio’s vision for a stronger, more sustainable, resilient, and equitable future.”