Electronics company NEC Australia this week hosted a breakfast event that coincided with the company releasing its latest whitepaper, entitled “Evolving AI Solutions in Transport and Infrastructure Management”.
The company released its white paper as part of the ITS Australia Summit in Sydney, where it gathered industry leaders to discuss the most pressing issues and trends in transport technology.
NEC says its latest whitepaper provides insights into the use of Artificial Intelligence to address current challenges facing the public transport industry.
A panel discussion at the breakfast event featured industry leaders, NEC’s head of smart transport for Australia and New Zealand, Mark Messenger, Amazon Web Services’, senior account executive for transport, Chris Nielsen, and UNSW professor of transport engineering, Professor Vinayak Dixit,.
NEC says the panel explored some of the challenges the industry faces with AI and what it describes as the “importance of gradually introducing new technology to build trust”.
The company says the presentation highlighted that AI is not a new concept and that it’s been utilised for years. However, with the recent surge in discussions around generative AI, NEC says it showcased several longstanding AI solutions it has implemented, such as pot-hole detection on roads, maintenance management systems, and road enforcement solutions
Commenting at the event, Mark Messenger said that the main challenge for governments in adopting AI revolves around trust, including trust in the government’s intentions to act in the best interest of its constituents, and trust in the technology itself.
“By introducing AI gradually, we can ensure that its benefits are proven before widescale adoption. Additionally, designing the technology in a way that makes its decision-making process transparent and explainable is crucial for building trust. We don’t build these systems as ‘black boxes,” Messenger said.
Professor Dixit emphasised the importance of trust and the need for society to have evidence on the effectiveness of new technologies.
“Society requires solid evidence on the effectiveness of new technologies, particularly in how they align with contextual needs,” the Professor said.
“For instance, a train scheduler who provides arrival and departure times must be able to explain how they arrived at those conclusions. Success isn’t just about being correct 99 per cent of the time; it’s about being able to explain the decision-making process 99 er cent of the time, ensuring transparency and trust,” the Professor said.
Amazon’s Chris Nielsen said that generative AI and Cloud is forcing the world to rethink how it deploys technology, moving beyond large scale heavily engineered risk-based solutions to more agile small-scale innovation.
“NEC is an exemplar of this approach with the end goal in mind to deliver rapid, scalable and customer centred innovation,” said Nielsen.
According to NEC some of the key highlights from its whitepaper included the fact that the transportation sector is undergoing a significant transformation fuelled by rapid technological advancements and that AI solutions are at the forefront of this evolution, offering promising avenues for enhancing operational efficiency, safety, and sustainability.
It also highlighted AI role in predictive maintenance in that it can predict failures before they happen, which would slash downtime and maintenance costs while boosting safety.
Additionally it highlighted how AI solutions can help optimise traffic, reduce congestion, and enhance public transport efficiency, driving smart city growth.
It also spoke to the fact that AI has the potential to reduce carbon emissions with smarter route planning and energy use and how AI-powered systems can detect and respond to incidents in real-time, creating safer transport environments to make for a safer transport environment.
The paper also mentioned the belief that AI could be set to revolutionise urban mobility with autonomous vehicles and next-gen traffic management.
The company says that integrating modern AI technologies into transportation and infrastructure management is essential for addressing current challenges and future-proofing the industry, and that NEC Australia is poised to lead the transformation, by leveraging AI technologies and spatial analytics to address challenges in public transportation and infrastructure management across Australia and New Zealand.
NEC says it has also partnered with Hayden AI to introduce a new bus lane and bus stop enforcement technology platform. which is designed to enhance road safety, sustainability, and the accessibility of public transport.
“Today’s discussion highlights the transformative impact of AI and emerging technologies on the transport sector. With NEC’s global expertise, local experience and commitment to innovation and collaboration, we are paving the way for smarter, more sustainable transport solutions,” Mark Messenger concluded.
