RFID-Cloud Integration for Smart Management of Public Car Parking Spaces

Effective management of public shared spaces such as car parking space, is one challenging transformational aspect for many cities, especially in the developing World. By leveraging sensing technologies, cloud computing, and Artificial Intelligence, Cities are increasingly being managed smartly. Smart Cities not only bring convenience to City dwellers, but also improve their quality of life as advocated for by United Nations in the 2030 Sustainable Development Goal on Sustainable Cities and Communities. Through integration of Internet of Things and Cloud Computing, this paper presents a successful proof-of-concept implementation of a framework for managing public car parking spaces. Reservation of parking slots is done through a cloud-hosted application, while access to and out of the parking slot is enabled through Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) technology which in real-time, accordingly triggers update of the parking slot availability in the cloud-hosted database. This framework could bring considerable convenience to City dwellers since motorists only have to drive to a parking space when sure of a vacant parking slot, an important stride towards realization of sustainable smart cities and communities.

IoT-Based Pothole Mapping Agent with Remote Visualization

Driving through pothole infested roads is a life hazard and economically costly. The experience is even worse for motorists using the pothole filled road for the first time. Pothole-filled road networks have been associated with severe traffic jam especially during peak times of the day. Besides not being fuel consumption friendly and being time wasting, traffic jams often lead to increased carbon emissions as well as noise pollution. Moreover, the risk of fatal accidents has also been strongly associated with potholes among other road network factors. Discovering potholes prior to using a particular road is therefore of significant importance. This work presents a successful demonstration of sensor-based pothole mapping agent that captures both the pothole's depth as well as its location coordinates, parameters that are then used to generate a pothole map for the agent's entire journey. The map can thus be shared with all motorists intending to use the same route.