Heavy-duty fleet operators such as waste management teams, street sweepers, and snow plow crews already have the herculean task of keeping city streets clean and safe year-round, day in and day out. 

These jobs give the crews and their vehicles a unique opportunity to act as the eyes of the city. Fleet operators are empowered to report issues they frequently encounter on the road such as potholes, litter, graffiti, hanging wires, broken street signs, and overturned bins that would typically result in citizen complaints to the city. 

In this article, we’ll explain how RUBICONSmartCity™, a technology offering powered by Amazon Web Services, enables drivers to leverage an onboard AI camera to document specific issues, such as potholes, recycling or organics contamination, or overflowing waste containers, without needing any human interaction. 

The documented information flows back to a manager portal so city staff can proactively address concerns and assign issues to the proper department in real-time, removing the need to wait for residents to call in before an issue is identified and remedied. 

Equipping vehicles to look for critical infrastructure and quality-of-life issues that can plague communities helps city partners deliver proactive government and equitable public service across all zip codes.

City spotlight: Kansas city prioritizes road repairs and public service

Kansas City, Missouri, is no stranger to smart city innovation. In fact, it was the first city to be selected for Google Fiber broadband internet service in 2011, and it boasts digital kiosks downtown while the KC Streetcar corridor features free WiFi. 

The city is continuing its mission, installing RUBICONSmartCity in its fleet of waste and recycling trucks, with 12 cameras to prioritize road repairs. The sanitation vehicles were configured to simultaneously collect data on potholes and poor street condition, while also collecting solid waste. 

The outcome? On-vehicle cameras captured 954 potholes over the span of six months.

All-in-one camera empowers cities of the future

The newest offering from RUBICONSmartCity is an AI-enabled camera, which can help to further transform municipal operations by improving the efficiency and process by which critical city infrastructure data is gathered. 

How it works: 

• All-in-one AI-enabled cameras can be installed on any type of vehicle. 
• Cameras placed either at the front of the cab or inside the waste hopper use AI models to scan for certain anomalies like potholes and contamination.
• The resulting data provides detailed insight into the state of city streets.
• Camera data is processed in near real-time by Rubicon’s Mobile Driver App, eliminating the need to replace memory cards or connect cameras to computers.

Example of AI cameras in action: An AI model can automatically detect and document contamination in hoppers, which helps to monitor and educate residents about recycling and organic waste programs. This is vital because recycling contamination is a pernicious problem and a core issue for all municipal recycling programs. 

This one device maximizes visibility and safety and allows cities to turn fleet vehicles into roving data collectors. 

Key features of RubiconSmartCity

• Users can access on-demand video from any camera angle for increased visibility into day-to-day operations
• AI-powered insights turn fleet vehicles into roving data collectors, maximizing existing resources to gather community intelligence.
• Using Rubicon’s AI software, cities can automatically detect and document a variety of issues, including:
  • Potholes to identify urgent road repairs before complaints arise.
  • Overflowing bins to enforce pay-as-you-throw policies or adjust container sizes.
  • Illegal dumping to identify hot spots and reduce pollution.
  • Hopper contamination to monitor recycling/organic waste programs and educate residents.

AI-enabled cameras benefit infrastructure and build goodwill

AI-enabled cameras help cities offer a higher level of service, with benefits that improve infrastructure and help foster goodwill with residents. Benefits include:

• Better service — confirming pick-ups, missed bins, and service issues with time-stamped footage. 
• Increased operational flexibility — minimizing downtime and helping departments adapt service plans according to real-time environmental conditions. 
• Enhanced safety — monitoring driver behavior and reconstructing events with video data to reduce accidents, protect the city from false claims, and improve overall safety.
• Proactive community engagement — now possible as cities can address issues before they become complaints, building trust and goodwill with residents. 
• Data-driven decisions — helping cities make informed choices based on real-time insights and historical data. 

“The quality of service has been significantly improved. It’s not about what we say, it’s what the citizens say. When we have such a large increase in citizen satisfaction in a short period…it’s certainly going in the right direction,” said Michael Shaw, Director of Public Works, Kansas City, Missouri. “Because of the success of Rubicon in our fleet, we are now expanding the deployment to our Street Maintenance Division. We’re using Rubicon’s camera technology in a pilot program to track potholes and street conditions as a way to continually improve our service.”

RUBICONSmartCity is a technology suite that helps local governments everywhere run more efficient, effective, and sustainable operations. A software-as-a-service (SaaS) offering originally designed for waste and recycling fleets, this full-service solution can be deployed across virtually any fleet to help reduce costs, improve service, and contribute to an enhanced quality of life for citizens. For more information, visit rubicon.com.