Germany’s Hamburg Port Authority (HPA) and Cisco have implemented Europe’s first ‘smartROAD’, to streamline road traffic using Internet of Everything approach.

The new approach will improve traffic flow, infrastructure condition, and environmental and resource management in the port area with real-time data and analytics.

The proof of concept would help HPA, Cisco and other ecosystem partners to deploy smartROAD in the Port of Hamburg, Germany.

The smartROAD is capable of detecting incidents automatically, to enable port road managers to monitor road traffic and coordinate with other authorities.

"At Cisco, we believe digitisation can help cities master the many challenges they are facing."

Structural sensors in the technology will provide real-time data on movable infrastructures, helping maintenance department chalk out maintenance and repairs works in a better way.

HPA chief information officer Dr Sebastian Saxe said: "With smartROAD, HPA is piloting an integrated concept of the Internet of Everything for the first time, with various relevant use cases for port and the city, running on a real infrastructure."

The environmental sensors provide data for analysing the environmental conditions along the port area.

Smart lighting, including ‘Follow Me Lighting’, is expected improve communication across the port and improve safety for pedestrians and cyclists.

A highly secure network infrastructure has been used to connect all the sensors and systems of the next generation road, while Cisco has implemented a comprehensive security framework for the installations to allow port managers take actions in real time.

Cisco has installed Kiwi’s software that will blur people and car plates for anonymous monitoring of traffic.

Cisco Industry Solutions executive vice-president Wim Elfrink said: "At Cisco, we believe digitisation can help cities master the many challenges they are facing.

"Here, in Hamburg in particular, the port plays a key role in the city’s economy and its development. That’s why we are supporting Hamburg Port Authority to grow capacity by using their infrastructure more efficiently."

The smartROAD proof of concept has been developed in partnership with Philips (intelligent lighting), AGT International (analytics software), T-Systems (Deutsche Telekom’s IT services and consulting division), World Sensing (monitoring and sensors) and Kiwi (video analytics and anonymisation).