First Smart Street in Croatia is opened

Tourist gem and city of the future, Dubrovnik now presents its first Smart Street – a result of the recently announced cooperation between our subsidiary Hrvatski Telekom and the city of Dubrovnik.

Dubrovnik is a tourist magnet attracting over 25,000 tourists a day during peak season. So it comes as no surprise that the Croatian city is a candidate for the title “European Capital of Culture 2020” expected to generate substantial cultural, social, and economic benefits and also helping to raise visibility and profile of this extraordinary municipality on an ever vaster international scale.

The recently announced partnership of Hrvatski Telekom and the city of Dubrovnik also supports this initiative based on dedicated DT-wide initiative. Smart Street – Obala Stjepana Radića, the first joint pilot project aiming to position Hrvatski Telekom’s reference Smart City Center. Our long-time IT partner Cisco and several local partners supported Hrvatski Telekom in implementing this project successfully.

Making Citizens’ Lives Easier
The Smart Street directly addresses citizens’ daily municipal challenges as traffic jams or the search for available parking space. It also supports associated savings on energy and city and regional finance. How does it work? In a nutshell, public lighting with a multi-functional sensor network and a variety of access technologies from optical links to 4G and WiFi networks connects traffic participants to infrastructural information regarding key city services.

Residents and visitors to Dubrovnik can access high-speed internet free of charge within the pilot project’s footprint. Traffic congestion could be a thing of the past now that Dubrovnik’s roadway management uses cameras to identify the causes of obstructions. And finding available parking space is becoming a lot easier: Smartphone apps and digital panels provide real-time information on the availability of parking space – all over the city. This world premiere parking system is able to automatically recognize vehicles and remotely charge parking fees. All solutions are connected with existing city systems and the Cisco Digital Platform will keep all collected data open for the development of new solutions.

The general public is not the only beneficiary. The city of Dubrovnik can make smart use of its Smart Street, making more informed decisions, delivering new services and opening up new ways to communicate and interact with its citizens and visitors.

Preparation is key
To turn the Smart City into reality, a well-developed infrastructure is required.  Hrvatski Telekom made significant progress last year when completing its IP network transformation, becoming the third telecommunications provider in the EU to transfer all users and services to an All-IP environment.

This smart city pilot project is just the beginning. Other projects are about to be  implemented to enable Smart City solutions in making life easier all over Croatia and soon also other European countries. These projects provide feasible solutions for the biggest challenges that cities face nowadays: emission, traffic congestion and energy consumption. Deutsche Telekom will play a key role in the future of cities and municipal development. Our aim is to provide leading examples of how to support citizens in making their lives better.

Read more about smart cities here: /2016/01/21/smart-cities-a-bunch-of-opportunities/