Wi-Fi

There are 2 posts tagged Wi-Fi.

Iknaia Launches Airscan with Colas

AirScan-App-and-HardwareOne of Highways England’s key objectives is to provide road users with information that is relevant to their journeys. Smart motorways are an obvious example and now, thanks to pioneering work from leading transport infrastructure specialist Colas Limited, information on travel times through roadworks is also available in real time. This means drivers are better informed, improving their experience and thereby reducing the risk to road workers of hazardous driving.

Automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) can often be utilised to track the progress of vehicles, but with diversion routes that may vary in location and route on a nightly basis, its use is not always practical nor cost effective. Colas has worked with wireless systems technology experts Iknaia to develop a system that allows the real time active management of diversion routes without recourse to ANPR technology.

Airscan is a new system developed jointly by Colas and Iknaia which uses anonymous Wi-Fi and Bluetooth signals transmitted by visible devices in passing vehicles. Data is collected by sensors and relayed to variable messaging signs (VMS) which then advise road users in advance of potential delays and allow for strategic checks by maintenance teams. As part of the system, Traffic Management (TM) teams are also issued with Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) tags that can be used to monitor the location of teams by checking in staff as they pass sensors on their route.

26.10.2015_prRyan Wood, Colas Technical Manager, is key contact for the project and has been responsible for its initial trial at Highways England’s M3 smart motorway upgrade, for main contractor Balfour Beatty. “We are committed to delivering innovation on our highways projects and, through our work with Iknaia, we believe that Airscan is a solution that will not only benefit road users through real-time updates on traffic, but will also assist in improving the safety of our road workers.”

This approach to active management of diversion routes will continue to operate on the M3 smart motorway project and will be rolled out across other Highways England schemes to complement Intelligent Transport Systems strategies across the UK.

Bluetooth 4.0 helps keep Construction Sites on Track

power tunnel

Tracking Workers using Bluetooth 4.0

Knowing exactly where valuable tools and equipment are in “real time” can be key to a successful construction project, as can protecting employees in an industry where accidents and injury are an ever present danger.

RFID (radio-frequency identification) technology has been widely used for tracking tools, equipment, materials and there are numerous GPS tracking systems available to track the location of vehicles coming in and out of the jobsite.

However, the advent of a new technology, Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) or Bluetooth 4.0, has emerged and has much wider uses to improve the ability of construction businesses to keep track of a much wider variety of assets even down to individual tools and log and monitor activities on site and to improve health and safety.

GPS doesn’t work indoors or underground and RFID offers limited communication, whereas BLE is easily deployable in a wider range of locations, it’s very low power and is a lot more flexible when it comes to converging technology, making it a more ‘Future Proof’ investment.

BLE has the capability to track and monitor workers and assets more accurately, with the added functionality of being able to integrate into legacy back end systems to send audio and content to connected mobile devices (approx. 80% of all recent mobile devices).  Adopted by IOS, Android and Windows operating systems, its low power and cost, as well as its robust and reliable communication means BLE is quickly becoming the technology of choice.

One such company, Iknaia (www.iknaiatracking.com), London, UK, has built a completely robust end to end solution combing BLE and Wi-Fi. Iknaia’s beacons present their location to their detectors in ‘real-time’. In addition the detectors can connect to mobile devices and send content specific to that device based on its proximity.

Julia McNally, Founder explains: “One of the difficult issues facing organisations planning to deploy new technologies is how they can all integrate and become completely interoperable with any existing and future technology. Iknaia’s solution offers a ‘future-proof’ IT environment. Our installation covers a wide range of solutions including full Wi-Fi mesh connectivity, offering public/corporate channels; Beacon scanning and detecting; integration with back end systems to push relevant content to connecting mobile devices.”

McNally continues, “in addition to tracking valuable assets we can control access to site areas, track workers location, check their health, send alerts to them, send content to their mobile devices and enable them to communicate back. BLE also enables us to add on so many extra features, such as payment systems, check-in applications, CCTV cameras and much more.”

Iknaia’s data is pushed into the cloud and presented on an easy to use online management console, optimised for all devices; PC, tablets and Smartphones.

With Apple and Google adopting beacon technology and developing applications using BLE, we’ll see a lot more uses for this technology in years to come.