Smart city solutions providing sustainable living

It allows cities or communities to monitor their emissions and water loss, improve energy efficiency, provide smart parking, and traffic management, smart lighting, and many other improvements. Alongside this effort, Telekom Slovenije is also establishing free public WiFi networks in the scope of the WiFi4EU project across a growing number of towns and cities in Slovenia.

​Telekom Slovenije has designed its smart city solutions to cover a broad spectrum of inhabitants’ needs. The first are the solutions for smart management of traffic flows, parking spaces and electric vehicle charging points. The second are solutions for decreasing emissions and water loss. These are followed by solutions for monitoring air and water quality, noise levels and precipitation, as well as solutions for improving energy efficiency. Among the most popular ones are solutions for efficient and smart lighting, and solutions for monitoring the satisfaction of inhabitants. All the solutions are connected by a common platform, which is simple to use, while open for connections with third parties and upgrades that technological development will bring. This will allow cities, towns, and communities to become even more efficient and friendly to their inhabitants and the environment.
Additionally, Telekom Slovenije can also establish a system that monitors waste bins, flows of critical watercourses that can forecast flooding, and systems for traffic flow regulation, based on certified systems that are also able to monitor traffic on longer traffic sections, e.g., even through whole settlements.

Central communication station and e-vehicle charging stations at Zagorje ob Savi
Telekom Slovenije has already implemented some of its smart city solutions in the town of Zagorje ob Savi. The installation includes a central communication station, which is a smart street lamp that also supports monitoring and analysis of different parameters for better resource management and planning, including public lighting, parking spots, utility services, and similar. Zagorje ob Savi was also the first in Slovenia to commercially implement the smart city solution based on Narrowband Internet of Things (NB-IoT) technology. The central communication station also functions as a charging station for electric vehicles. The station is installed and maintained by Telekom Slovenije, and municipalities do not need to purchase any equipment.

Digitalised utility monitoring
Telekom Slovenije provides managers of business premises, office spaces and shopping centres a digitalised method for monitoring utility use with a remote metering system based on IoT technology. Remote metering is possible in real time, and this also provides the manager with an always-on insight into utility usage, allows them to analytically process the collected data, makes it easier to plan future energy needs, and reach decisions regarding environmental care. One of the implementations is based in Velenje, where Telekom Slovenije and its partners introduced a solution for the Velenje Public Utility Company that allows them to digitalize and simplify central meter management and automatic metering. Telekom Slovenije is also establishing such a solution for remote metering in shopping centres.

Smart parking in Tržič
In the town of Tržič, Telekom Slovenije has established a system for routing traffic with smart parking spaces that makes it easier for locals and tourists to find parking spaces at several key locations, and provides an overview over available parking spaces, thereby reducing the impact of traffic on the town. Surveys have shown that nearly a third of the traffic in the town centre are drivers looking for available parking spaces. The system covers more than one hundred parking spaces at several locations. All of them are equipped with smart vision sensors, and with the support of backend systems they ensure that drivers are routed to available parking spaces, while municipality services have a constant insight into the availability of parking spaces and other statistics that make it easier to control traffic flows in the town.

Uniform smart city platform in Novo Mesto
In Novo Mesto, Telekom Slovenije has established a pilot advanced uniform smart city platform that supports comprehensive data collection and processing related to services, such as availability of parking spaces, smart street lighting, measuring citizen satisfaction, capture and use of water and energy. In the Novo Mesto pilot, the company also tested environmental sensors that provide the municipality a detailed insight into the air quality, temperature, air pressure, humidity, dust particles, carbon monoxide, nitrous and sulphur dioxide, ozone, and noise levels. The platform is open to new partners, and represents a scalable foundation for a comprehensive introduction of all smart city services. With this pilot project Novo Mesto municipality and Telekom Slovenije gained valuable experience for future endeavours in the introduction of IoT solutions for smart cities and communities.

The system for traffic calming is already up and running in Kranj
An important component of advanced solutions are systems for traffic calming, as they can have a positive impact on the safety of all those participating in traffic. The first such system has been established in Kranj. Here, Telekom Slovenije provided the technical solution and ensures system management and maintenance, while all the data is securely stored in the cloud. Users with authorisation for accessing the data (i.e., traffic wardens) receive the reports on speed measurements, and can act in accordance with the law when there are violations. With this model, the municipality can lease the service for a certain period, so that it does not require any up-front investment. The equipment used is certified, and Telekom Slovenije has obtained all the required licenses of the Metrology Institute of the Republic of Slovenia.

The foundation is good connectivity in Slovenia’s first network
Telekom Slovenije can provide connectivity for all the devices and sensors installed through internet of things technology NB-IoT, which it was the first to launch in Slovenia, and the uniform platform for managing connected systems. It also manages the biggest fibre optic network in Slovenia, and provides the most advanced services in mobile networks. It was the first to establish the fastest mobile 5G network, which was developed with a focus on the needs of communities, cities, citizens, and companies, while also providing cyber security solutions to individuals, communities, municipalities, and businesses.