UNIVERSIDAD SANTO TOMÁS

INSTITUTO DE LENGUAS FRAY BERNARDO DE LUGO

Level 6 IND ING Unit 5 IoT WORKSHOP

NAMES: ___________________________,___________________________, _______________________.

READING
Read the following article and then do the activities below.

The Internet of Things and Smart Cities

By Special Guest
Ajit Singh, Assistant Professor, Patna Women’s College, Bihar, India April 10, 2019

Unless you’ve been stuck under that proverbial rock for a few years, you’ve at least heard of the
Internet of Things (IoT) and how it is connecting us in new and interesting ways. The rise of the smart
home is one way that the IoT is changing things for people around the world – homes filled with
devices that can communicate with one another, with people living in the home, and even with
outside third parties (think a refrigerator automatically contacting a grocery store when key items like
milk or eggs run low to order more).

However, this technology is not constrained just to our homes. It’s growing in terms of both scope
and capabilities. Enter the smart city, where the Internet of Things will impact everything from lighting
to the flow of traffic through urban centers.

The IEEE Standards Association says of Smart Cities: “As world urbanization continues to grow and
the total population expected to double by 2050, there exists an increased demand for intelligent,
sustainable environments that reduce environmental impact and over citizens a high quality life. A
smart city brings together technology, government and society to enable a smart economy, smart
mobility, a smart environment, smart people, smart living and smart governance.”
We need to turn to actual use cases to determine what defines a smart city. There are quite a few
ways in which this sort of technology is being utilized today around the globe, including the following:
 Sensors built into bridges to sense things like degradation and the effect of seismic forces at
work.
 Sensors built into roadways to sense things like subsidence and wear and tear, as well as
traffic flow.
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 Sensors built into buildings to sense things like the force of wind, foundation subsidence,
seismic activity, and more.
 Sensors within the interior of buildings to sense the presence of people within rooms, and
thereby control the use of lighting, heating and air, and other systems to limit energy expenditure
when it is unnecessary.
 Sensors at entryways to provide facial recognition for better security within apartment
buildings, commercial buildings, government offices, and more.

What’s Driving the Push Toward Smart Cities?

At first glance, the rush towards IoT adoption seems to be one of convenience, similar to the use of
smart technology within a home. For instance, no one really needs a refrigerator that can reorder
groceries when the on-hand supply gets low. It’s convenience.

The same concept does not apply to the integration of smart technology within city infrastructure.
Here, it’s more about achieving important goals, such as improving the use life and management of
infrastructure, enhancing resident safety, and cutting costs and energy usage to be greener. (A)
_______.

Infrastructure Management and Maintenance: Many cities around the world are suffering from
decaying infrastructure. Roads are degrading. Railroad tracks are decaying. Bridges and overpasses
are aging and becoming unsafe. IoT technology can embed sensors in these areas to determine a
broad range of things, including the extent of degradation, daily traffic flow increases, temperature
extremes that may exacerbate damage, safety issues that could lead to mass injuries or loss of life,
and more. Simply put, by utilizing IoT technology, cities and municipalities can better monitor the
condition of their infrastructure, and manage those resources better, leading to improvements in
safety, replacement costs and frequency, and more.
Security: As mentioned previously, IoT technology allows the addition of new security features to
buildings, offices, residential homes, and more. (B) _______. As populations grow, the need for
improved security also increases – biometric systems offer the means to improve security and safety
for homeowners, business owners and workers, government employees and many more.
Reduction in the Use of Energy: Our cities are hungrier for power than ever before. Much of this
energy is drawn from non-renewable sources, such as coal. Even cities with access to relatively
renewable resources, such as hydropower, or nuclear power generation can benefit from a reduction
in raw demand. IoT technology offers an immense capability to reduce energy consumption,

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particularly wasted energy lighting and heating/cooling rooms people are not currently using. By
focusing on zoned lighting/heating/cooling, cities can dramatically decrease their demand on the
energy grid.
Improved Communication Capabilities: The development and installation of smart networks allows
improved communication capabilities from virtually all areas of a city. It is possible for things like
traffic lights to communicate with the city council or responsible agency, and for grids within city parks
to communicate with the parks department.
Emergency Preparedness and Environmental Awareness: Smart technology within cities can be
instrumental in emergency preparedness and improving environmental awareness. For instance,
remote sensors could detect things ranging from changing barometric pressure to wind speed/shear
and help predict weather changes.
Traffic Flow and Congestion Prevention: One of the most important drivers of cities adopting smart
technology has to do with managing traffic flow. Today’s cities are mired in traffic congestion, but IoT
technology has the ability to better manage traffic flow within urban centers and on highways.
Sensors can communicate everything from the number of vehicles passing a specific spot to the
weight of vehicles driving over them to the speed of vehicles and more. This can play a role in
achieving important outcomes such as reducing traffic snarls, cutting down on the amount of time
commuters must sit in gridlock, and even potentially eliminating the most negative impacts of rush
hour completely.

Improved safety, improved road management and maintenance, reduced time spent waiting – these
are just the tip of the proverbial iceberg. For example, New York City invested in smart sensors with
the goal of determining where drivers most frequently made sharp turns and hard stops, which is
allowing them to determine what areas need changes made to the environment to reduce the
potential for accidents and congestion.

While all of these drivers are important reasons for the adoption of smart technology within cities, the
drive to better manage traffic is one of those with the most immediate impacts, (C) ______.

The IoT and Traffic Situations in Our Cities

Smart technology is already having a major impact on traffic. It has already been used by many cities
in the US to achieve important goals, and will be implemented by many others within a short period.
In this section, we will look at some of the most important current use cases and their benefits, as well

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as vital ways that smart cities will make use of IoT technology in the future to better manage traffic
flow and prevent congestion on surface streets, highways and motorways.

At this moment, our cities are experiencing population surges. That leads to more and more vehicles
on our roadways. All of those vehicles on the roads lead to problems, including:

 Longer waits at stoplights

 A dramatic increase in accidents

 Longer wait times for commuters

 Longer periods of gridlock – the growth of rush hour to cover most of the day in many cities

 An increasing number of wrong-way drivers on one-way streets

 An increase in the amount of debris on roadways (leading to accidents)

Smart technology can help reduce those numbers and the associated costs by a significant amount.
In some cases, it already is.

Adaptive Traffic Signals

One of the simplest, yet most beneficial smart city technologies is the traffic light. When connected to
the Internet, these become adaptive, allowing timing to be changed depending on the time of day, the
volume of traffic, and other factors, such as the flow of pedestrian traffic, special events, and more.

The Growth of Smart Corridors

Smart corridor is the name given to specific areas of road networks heavily embedded with smart
technology to achieve multiple goals. For instance, there is a stretch of interstate in Wyoming that is
heavily used by both commuters and by shipping/distribution companies. Another example would be
I-285 around the city of Atlanta, which experiences major delays due to its use by both 18-wheelers
and passenger vehicles.

Smart corridors use a wide range of technology to create adaptive capabilities, including smart speed
limit signs that increase or decrease depending on traffic flow or time of day, automatic lane closures,
the use of smart cameras, real-time weather updates from short -range communication devices, and
more.

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Toll Changes
Toll roads are nothing new, but the ability to charge different tolls based on driving conditions is.
There are many examples of these systems in place, including Atlanta, Georgia. This system charges
a toll for exiting from the express lane, and the fee varies based on the time of day, the day of the
week, the demand for the exit, and other factors.

The Internet of Things is here to stay, and nowhere is that more apparent than in the adoption of
smart technology within cities around the world. While it might not be universal yet, adoption speed is
increasing as the significant benefits of smart technology become better understood and access to
this technology becomes more widespread.

RETRIEVED AND ADAPTED FROM:

HTTPS://WWW.IOTEVOLUTIONWORLD.COM/SMART-HOME/ARTICLES/441882-INTERNET-THINGS-SMART-
CITIES.HTM

1. Read paragraph 1 again, what is the main idea?

________________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________________
2. Identifying referents
What do the following words in bold refer to in the text?

Referent Refers to
it’s
these
which

3. Decide if the following statements are True (T), False (F) or there is No Information (NI) about it in
the text.

a. Governments can benefit from smart cities. ______

b. Smart technology is being adopted at a slow pace. ______
c. Smart corridors will bring the increase in the cost of bus tickets. ______

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4. Some phrases have been removed from the text, place them in the corresponding place (A, B
or C) according to the context:

PHRASE LOCATION IN
THE TEXT
1. Facial recognition systems are just one aspect of this
2. which has made it one of the most common starting
points for cities interested in experimenting with IoT
technology
3. To really understand the rise of smart cities, we need
to delve into some of the drivers behind the adoption of
this technology.

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