Bristol City Council wins Best Smart City Award with help from Siemens Mobility

Bristol City Council wins Best Smart City Award with help from Siemens Mobility

Bristol City Council was named winner of the ‘Best Smart City Project’ at this year’s Smarter Travel Awards, receiving the award for its outstanding Traffic Control Service which moved into the council’s Operations Centre in 2017.

From the Operations Centre, Bristol’s Traffic Control team manage the city’s road network using a range of intelligent infrastructure tools, with the latest evolution of Stratos, Siemens Mobility’s proven integrated highways management system, at its heart.

This new centre was the realisation of a long-held ambition to bring together three Control Centres in to a purpose-built, state-of-the-art facility, which is now home to the Traffic Control Centre, Emergency Control Centre, and Community Safety (CCTV) Control Rooms.

Cllr Craig Cheney, Deputy Mayor and Cabinet Member for Finance, Governance and Performance said: “The Bristol Operations Centre has grown from strength to strength over the past year, providing an essential service in an innovative space. By using Siemens Mobility’s technology, the council’s traffic management team can act in a more efficient and coordinated way which has had a hugely positive impact on the people who live here.”

The new traffic management system is cloud-hosted, ensuring it is not only robust, secure and resilient, but also routinely backed-up and future-proof. The system features an urban traffic control (UTC) system running SCOOT (Split, Cycle, Offset Optimisation Technique), a real-time traffic control and monitoring solution.

This adaptive system is connected to the network’s traffic signals at junctions and crossings and collects data from on street detectors to optimise the flow of traffic at controlled junctions and so reduce the overall delay to drivers. Effectively SCOOT maximises the available network capacity across the city network.

Wilke Reints, Managing Director for Intelligent Traffic Systems at Siemens Mobility Limited, said: “We’re thrilled that the Bristol Traffic Control Service has been recognised with this award and delighted to have worked so closely with the team to deliver such an outstanding intelligent infrastructure solution. Now approaching its first anniversary, the system has delivered real operational efficiencies, which in turn have benefitted the travelling public.”

The award was announced as part of the Smarter Travel LIVE! 2018 event. Held annually, the Smarter Travel Awards aim to recognise and showcase the smart projects, people and technologies that are defining future mobility, celebrating their success and impact.