News on SmartRoadSense

“Balance Trucks” now released!

Mon, 29 Apr 2019 00:00:00 +0000

The brand new version 4.0 of the SmartRoadSense mobile app is now available: it introduces an entirely new mode that allow users to play with the data they just collected. Players will have to transport frangible objects on a vehicle moving on uneven terrain, which is generated using precedently collected road quality data. The game, developed in cooperation with the Disruptive Media Learning Lab at Coventry University, within the CROWD4ROADS project, aims at giving users insight into the data they collected and making them more aware of road maintenance issues.

Innovation for the Digital Society

Tue, 19 Mar 2019 00:00:00 +0000

Over the course of the last 3 years, SmartRoadSense has been part of the CROWD4ROADS project (or C4Rs, for short). C4Rs combines 7 partners across Europe under the “CAPSSI” umbrella (i.e., Collective Awareness Platforms for Sustainability and Social Innovation), which aims at exploring the opportunities and potential for Digital Social Innovation (DSI) based on bottom-up solutions, citizen participation, openness, and decentralization, to tackle important issues that affect society. The Digital Social Innovation Manifesto, drafted by a team of innovators, provides an insight into these concepts and how they can be applied to provide more powerful civic participation within democratic and social processes.

“Balance Trucks” sneak peek

Wed, 13 Feb 2019 14:23:19 +0100

Check out the new video preview of “Balance Trucks”, the game mode of SmartRoadSense that will allow you to play with road quality data you collected. The game will be released in the next major version of SmartRoadSense.

Collaboration agreement with the Danish Road Directorate

Wed, 12 Dec 2018 00:00:00 +0000

We are excited to announce that the University of Urbino and the Pavement division (Befæsteler) at the Danish Road Directorate (Vejdirektoratet) have recently signed a collaboration agreement with the intent to further study and evaluate the potentialities of algorithms and road quality models developed and implemented by SmartRoadSense. We look forward to cooperating with the Vejdirektoratet and to fully deploy SmartRoadSense in Denmark.

Back from Web Summit 2018

Mon, 12 Nov 2018 00:00:00 +0000

Our CROWD4ROADS team is back from Web Summit 2018, the largest tech conference in Europe. There they joined other CAPS projects at the “Social Innovation Village”, hosted by the Social Good Accelerator, and endured four intense days attending our booth, listening to talks, and walking around the huge area (mostly with a blank expression on their faces). Our CROWD4ROADS stand within the Social Innovation Village. Founder of the Web Tim Berners-Lee captivated the audience at the opening ceremony and stressed the obligations of the community to close the digital divide and fix the Web for everybody.

The Road to Web Summit 2018

Sat, 03 Nov 2018 00:00:00 +0000

The largest tech conference in Europe, Web Summit 2018, will start next monday 5 November in Lisbon: among the giants of the Web, industry leaders, entrepreneurs, and tech enthusiasts, the CROWD4ROADS project will also be there and join the “Social Innovation Village” hosted by the Social Good Accelerator. Read the full press release. Come visit us at our CROWD4ROADS booth on 6 November, in Pavillion 2, E213! Also, we will be at the “Tech for Impact: focus on Sustainable Cities” event hosted by makesense at Casa de Impacto.

CROWD4ROADS Summer School recap

Sat, 29 Sep 2018 00:00:00 +0000

On the 25th September morning we kicked off the CROWD4ROADS “Crowdsourcing for the Common Good” Summer School, hosted by the University of Urbino at Collegio Raffaello in Urbino. 24 people registered to the school for two days of sessions about collective intelligence, crowdsensing, data privacy, and gamification and the final “Data Jam” event. Sessions included talks by Dragos Sebastian Cristea (University “Dunărea de Jos” of Galați) about Machine Learning, Marco Ciurcina from project DECODE, prof.

Estate Marchigiana events come to a close

Wed, 05 Sep 2018 00:00:00 +0000

This year, Regione Marche and the CROWD4ROADS project have partnered in a long series of public events that were held during the summer months. All events have been promoted by the region’s administration and by local communities, promoting the adoption of SmartRoadSense and the use of trip sharing solutions such as BlaBlaCar. The Risorgi Marche festival had a very large resonance among the local population and nearby regions, attracting more than 150.

Interview on StartupItalia!

Thu, 23 Aug 2018 00:00:00 +0000

In a new article published on StartupItalia!, Carlo Terzano interviews prof. Alessandro Bogliolo from the University of Urbino and talks about SmartRoadSense, crowdsensing initiatives, active citizenship, and the importance road infrastructure maintenance, felt by many to be especially inadequate in the wake of the recent tragedy in Genoa. “Roads, recent political discussions aside, are a common good and it should be in everyone’s interest, not only as drivers but as citizens, to participate in monitoring activities to ensure that they are maintained in proper order.

C4Rs Summer School registration is now open!

Thu, 19 Jul 2018 00:00:00 +0000

The registration process for the “Crowdsourcing for the Common Good” Summer School organized by the CROWD4ROADS project is now open! The Summer School will be held in Urbino (Italy) from September 24th to 27th, 2018 and will include two days of sessions about social innovation, collective intelligence, crowdsensing, data privacy, and gamification and one full day “Data Jam” (a Hackaton-like all night long event). Check out the Summer School page for further details.

Survey for the BlaBlaCar community

Thu, 12 Jul 2018 00:00:00 +0000

BlaBlaCar, as one of our partners within the CROWD4ROADS project, has launched a short survey for its online community about road transport sustainability, digital innovation, and further SmartRoadSense developments: it will help us to gather a better understanding of these issues and the interest of the community. Please take a moment to answer the online survey! (In Italian.)

Explore RisorgiMarche with CROWD4ROADS and SmartRoadSense

Thu, 05 Jul 2018 00:00:00 +0000

Road quality is an essential factor for the social and economic development of any territory. Timely maintenance operations of the infrastructure are paramount and rely on up-to-date knowledge about road conditions. For years University of Urbino has been developing technologies that allow all drivers to contribute anonymously to the continuous collection of road quality data. SmartRoadSense is a free mobile app that makes use of smartphone accelerometers to automatically detect road conditions, which contribute to an open road quality dataset and are shared through an online map.

Join us at the DSI Fair 2018!

Fri, 01 Jun 2018 00:00:00 +0000

From the 6th to the 7th of June, we will be at the Digital Social Innovation Fair 2018. The event will be held at the Campidoglio in Rome and it will be a stimulating meeting point for several European CAPSSI projects, with interesting talks, round-tables, and panels about digital innovation, digital platforms, crowdsourcing, open data, and much more… We, together with our CROWD4ROADS partners, will be chairing the “Collective intelligence and crowdsourcing for social good” workshop, 14:30–16:00 on Thursday 7th June.

CROWD4ROADS gets the “Premio PA Sostenibile” award

Wed, 23 May 2018 00:00:00 +0000

This morning we were at the convention center “La Nuvola” in Rome, to attend the PA Forum event on sustainable innovation for the Italian public administration as members of the CROWD4ROADS project.

Among a total of 258 projects, CROWD4ROADS was selected as one of the noteworthy initiatives for public administrations to meet the innovation and sustainbility goals established by the UN 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

Lorenz Cuno Klopfenstein proudly receives the award on behalf of the CROWD4ROADS project.

New website online!

Mon, 21 May 2018 00:00:00 +0000

The project’s website has just been updated: apart from the new coat of paint, the new website includes more information about how the system works, a revised interactive map, and a new privacy policy that expands on how data from our contributors is anonymized.

New CROWD4ROADS promo video

Tue, 24 Apr 2018 00:00:00 +0000

We recently posted a new promo video of the CROWD4ROADS project, by Prof. Alessandro Bogliolo: the project aims at involving drivers and citizens in road transport sustainability, through the rationalization of vehicle utilization, thanks to carpooling, and the adoption of easy-to-use instruments for the continuous monitoring of road quality, such as SmartRoadSense. Check out the video on Youtube below.

Developers, meet game designers

Tue, 27 Mar 2018 00:00:00 +0000

During the CROWD4ROADS project meeting in Coventry, UK, a group of hard-working game designers have delivered artworks and game design documents to the SmartRoadSense developers… Developers looking extremely pleased. The SmartRoadSense game is coming.

An appeal to car drivers

Thu, 15 Mar 2018 00:00:00 +0000

After the heavy damage to road infrastructure caused by the recent heavy snowfall in Italy, the University of Urbino has launched an appeal to car drivers and public transport operators to join in the effort of road quality monitoring by adopting SmartRoadSense. Accurate and up to date information can help directing maintenance and reconstruction efforts, which ensure better driving comfort and safety while also lowering overall road transport expenditure.

Pothole-hunting with an app

Fri, 09 Feb 2018 00:00:00 +0000

The online magazine “L’Automobile” by the Italian Automobile Club (ACI), just published a short overview of SmartRoadSense and the CROWD4ROADS project, highlighting how social innovation projects can have a large impact on communities and sustainability issues thanks to the contributions of a large number of citizens. ACI, which is on the CROWD4ROADS advisory board, is currently planning a country-wide promotional campaign about road quality monitoring through SmartRoadSense.

SmartRoadSense @ Open Government Week 2018

Mon, 05 Feb 2018 00:00:00 +0000

SmartRoadSense is proud to be an active part of the Italian Open Government Week 2018! During this event, our project coordinator Prof. Alessandro Bogliolo is going to present the new OpenData API we released a few days ago. This new SmartRoadSense feature will allow users to directly download sections of our continuously updated dataset in a simple way. Developers will be able to simply specify the coordinates of the region they are interested in and download the requested data section encoded in JSON.

C4Rs gamification whitepaper published

Wed, 20 Dec 2017 00:00:00 +0000

Thanks to the participation of Coventry University in the CROWD4ROADS project and the Disruptive Media Learning Lab’s (DMLL) expertise in adaptive learning techniques with an emphasis on gamification and learning through play, we are working to introduce new game elements within the SmartRoadSense app. Read all about the this initiative, its objectives, the proposed design, and the gameplay of the upcoming “Balance Trucks” game in the Whitepaper by Mark Lewis.

SmartRoadSense launches in Romania

Tue, 12 Dec 2017 00:00:00 +0000

This morning prof. Alessandro Bogliolo held a public presentation of the CROWD4ROADS project, in the Aula Magna hall of the University “Dunărea de Jos” in Galaţi (Romania) during an event organized by Fundația SATEAN, announcing that SmartRoadSense is now available in Romania. Romanian roads, just like roads in the UK, Greece, and Italy, can now be monitored by volunteers using the mobile app. Prof. Alessandro Bogliolo in Galaţi. More information and a video interview are available on the C4Rs website.

Sensors in your smartphone could make roads greener

Sat, 14 Oct 2017 00:00:00 +0000

SmartRoadSense and the CROWD4ROADS project are cited in HORIZON, the EU Research & Innovation magazine: The CROWD4ROADS project works through smartphones mounted in cars that can pick up changes in speed caused by bumps, holes or distributed roughness. This data can then be used by local authorities to know where they need to repair roads, which in turn makes their mobility sector more energy efficient. Check out the full article online.

Open data and sharing economy for road sustainability

Wed, 04 Oct 2017 00:00:00 +0000

SmartRoadSense and the CROWD4ROADS project are cited in an article about open data, sharing economy, and grassroots crowd-sensing initiatives, in the September–October issue of “Onda Verde”, the magazine by the Italian Automobile Club (ACI). Take a read online (in Italian).

SmartRoadSense goes to the cloud

Fri, 27 May 2016 00:00:00 +0000

You may have already noticed but… we have big plans for our project! At the moment, only drivers on the Italian road network are able to use SmartRoadSense. The idea of opening up the service for more drivers was always in the back of our heads. However, only a few weeks ago, we started thinking seriously about how to make our platform available from other countries as well. Days ago we took the first bold step: we moved our entire computing platform to Marche Cloud, the cloud service by Regione Marche (they are one of our partners in the CROWD4ROADS European project).

SmartRoadSense, reloaded!

Sun, 13 Dec 2015 00:00:00 +0000

The new and improved SmartRoadSense 3.0 is now ready, right on time for the holiday season, both for Apple iOS and Google Android. The original SmartRoadSense app for Android was released in February 2015 and has been on the road for months, achieving almost 25.000 kms of tracked roads thanks to our beta-testers and early adopters! In the meantime, the SmartRoadSense team has been feverishly working both on our infrastructure, the road quality measurement system and, of course, the mobile application.

Impressions from the CROWD4ROADS press conference

Thu, 03 Dec 2015 00:00:00 +0000

Some pictures taken during the press conference of the CROWD4ROADS European project in Urbino. The SmartRoadSense team: Alessandro Bogliolo, Antonio Esposito, Andrea Seraghiti, Lorenz Cuno Klopfenstein, Michele Sorcinelli, Brendan Paolini, Saverio Delpriori, Alberto Carini, Valerio Freschi, and Emanuele Lattanzi. Alessandro Bogliolo, Vilberto Stocchi, Flavio Vetrano. Vilberto Stocchi, dean of the University of Urbino. Andrea Sergiacomi, Regione Marche. Alessandro Bogliolo, project coordinator. Gianluca Cecchetti, BlaBlaCar.

CROWD4ROADS: the European project

Wed, 02 Dec 2015 00:00:00 +0000

Ideas such as “sharing economy“ and “active citizenship” providing a sizable contribution to sustainability initiatives about road infrastructure, passenger transport, and traffic. This is the main idea behind CROWD4ROADS (or “C4Rs” in short), the European project that, joining initiatives such as SmartRoadSense and BlaBlaCar, will leverage the impact of collective awareness, sustainbility, and social innovation on road networks. The project will be officially presented on 3 December 2015 in Urbino (Italy) at Collegio Raffaello.

More than 10,000 kms of roads monitored

Sun, 19 Apr 2015 00:00:00 +0000

The community of SmartRoadSense users has reached more than 10,000 kms of monitored roads!

Mapped 1% of Italian roads

Wed, 08 Apr 2015 00:00:00 +0000

SmartRoadSense was launched on 21 February. Since then, thanks to its early adopters, SmartRoadSense has monitored and mapped more than 1% of Italian roads. The net of coloured roads is growing fast, especially in the north of the peninsula. Join the SmartRoadSense community and monitor the quality of the roads you travel every day!

Tens of cities reached in one month

Sat, 28 Mar 2015 00:00:00 +0000

In just one month, SmartRoadSense has connected tens of cities which are hundreds of miles apart from each other, including Ancona, Bologna, Torino, Verona, Milano, Perugia, Mantova, Ravenna, and Genova.

In three weeks

Sat, 14 Mar 2015 00:00:00 +0000

After three weeks from the Italian release of SmartRoadSense, the 0.5% of Italian roads has been already visited and classified by our users. Thank you! This corresponds to more than 4,000 kms out of the 800,000 km of the Italian road network. Much road has been traveled, but much more remains!

In two weeks

Sat, 07 Mar 2015 00:00:00 +0000

Only two weeks have passed since the launch of SmartRoadSense in Italy. Thanks to our first 150 users, SmartRoadSense has covered more than 3,000 kms of road, it has processed more than 200 millions of acceleration readings, it has computed more than 700,000 roughness estimates, contributing to the online interactive map, and it has made available more than 14 MBs of open data online. The results achieved are more than encouraging and describe the full potential of this tool and the strength of the active participations by citizens in monitoring public assets, such as road infrastructure.

Here we go!

Sat, 21 Feb 2015 00:00:00 +0000

It’s all set: the mobile apps are available, the website is up, the slides are ready.

SmartRoadSense will be officially released during the “Open Data Day”, in a public event in the municipality hall of Pesaro.

On the same day, the city of Pesaro also announced that it will officially adopt SmartRoadSense for the systematic monitoring of its road network. Tests conducted during the past months have successfully mapped 75% of the network.