The municipality of Mechelen and the municipality of Bonheiden in Belgium deploy Zhaga motion sensor-based streetlights from Tvilight on the bicycle highway along the N15.
Amsterdam, the Netherlands, January 26, 2020 – Tvilight, in cooperation with Fluvius, installs state-of-the-art motion sensors on streetlights across the bicycle highway between Mechelen and Bonheiden. In addition to improving safety for cyclists and pedestrians, the solution also helps reducing energy wastage, light pollution and carbon footprint. Furthermore, it helps minimizing operating and maintenance costs of streetlights. It’s a one-of-a-kind project in Belgium thus far.
The bicycle path along the N15 is often used by Bonheiden youths who visit Mechelen during late evening hours. Poor lighting and dark spots on the bicycle path entailed unpredictability and a sense of insecurity for them. In order to address these issues, the municipality of Mechelen and the municipality of Bonheiden together explored various smart solutions and decided to equip smart lighting along the route.
Mechelen and Bonheiden approached Fluvius, one of the three largest network operators in Belgium and the main contractor for this project, which later partnered with Tvilight to offer motion sensor based smart street lighting solution. Such intelligent lighting offers just the right light, at the right place, at the right time, balancing the energy usage without compromising public comfort.
“Many youngsters visit the cinema, the skating ring, sports facilities and pubs around transit M (Mechelen) during late evening hours. Sometimes they move in group, but often alone, and then good lighting is essential for a better sense of safety. This is an initiative that I am happy to embrace.”
Abdrahman Labsir, City Council Member at Youth and Prevention
For this project, Tvilight provided CitySense Lite solution and the CityManager software platform. CitySense Lite solution contains Zhaga-based motion sensor and light controller. It offers true ‘Light-on-Demand’ and ‘Safe Circle of Light’ to a road occupant. Because of the standardized Zhaga (book 18) interface, deployment of the devices is rapid.
The ‘safe circle of light’ refers to the neighbor trigger functionality. Whenever the motion sensor detects an occupant, it also automatically triggers neighboring lights, encapsulating the road user in a safe circle of light. With the light following the user, be it a pedestrian or a cyclist, the sense of safety naturally increases. This beautifully balances energy usage and citizen safety.
The other part of the solution, CityManager platform, allows the operator to monitor, control and manage the entire streetlight infrastructure from a centralized place. Using the software, the performance and behavior of each streetlight can be recorded in customized reports. The platform also automatically generates alerts in case of errors or faults, allowing the operator to take prompt actions. Owing to the openness of the platform, integration of asset management was also made possible.
“All data that the sensors receive are securely stored and processed. That way, the lamps themselves 'learn' to adjust their brightness levels. For example, if a lot of people visit every day around a certain hour, the lighting system will already automatically adjust to 100%. Even when there is something to do on Transit M, the lamps would know and light-up”
Marina De Bie, City Council Member, Green Mechelen
Along with the improved safety and being able to collect anonymous data, the city is able to considerably save energy, reduce light pollution and minimize CO2 emissions. Furthermore, the cities now have a foundation for smart city applications, whereby it becomes easier to host multiple IoT systems right on the streetlights to further improve the public services.
“We are pleased to partner with Fluvius on this prestigious project. Fluvius brings forth years of experience with managing and operating over 1 million streetlights in Belgium. Tvilight’s connected lighting solution complements their vision to provide best-in-class solution to Belgium municipalities,” explains Chintan Shah, CEO & Founder of Tvilight.
ABOUT TVILIGHT (www.tvilight.com)
TVILIGHT PROJECTS B.V. is a European market leader, specializing in sensors, wireless lighting controllers, and a complete portfolio of street lighting management software – to manage, monitor, operate and maintain citywide public lighting infrastructure. Our smart lighting platform and Open API allow integration to city’s preferred software platform and thus constitute an open, reliable and future-proof base for Smart Cities and the Internet of Things. The company has an installed base of over 600 projects globally, including the iconic cities and critical infrastructures around the world. Tvilight’s international projects include Amsterdam Airport Schiphol, Dutch Railways, Port of Moerdijk, Seoul, Beijing, as well as some of the largest German cities such as Düren, Münster, Cologne, Dortmund, and Berlin.