Shoalhaven City Council uses AI to deliver safer roads to the community

After 14 declared natural disasters in just four years battered its roads, Shoalhaven City Council is using recycling trucks and artificial intelligence to tackle its pothole issues and keep the community safe.

Partnering with TechnologyOne and Retina Visions, two Australian technology companies, the council last year trialled placing cameras at the front of six recycling trucks to monitor road conditions. Footage from the cameras is scoured by artificial intelligence to identify potholes, road cracks or damage. The data is then triaged and sent on to the council’s asset management solution to create a work order and workers sent out to fix the problem quickly.

Carey McIntyre, Director City Services at Shoalhaven City Council, said the smart solution assists in addressing road asset repair pain points, namely low coverage, manual data entry, cost, data and reporting lag, and time wasted inspecting individual defects.

“As multiple storms, floods, bushfires and severe weather events hit the local government area between 2019 and 2022, Shoalhaven’s assets were severely impacted. We needed a solution to support field workers with the increasing demand and ensure safe roads for our community,” he said. “The solution detected 2000 defects a week in the first six months, from potholes and overhanging branches to debris on the road, cracks in the footpaths, graffiti, broken or damaged street signs and line mark deterioration, all of which affect the safety of our roads.”

In just two weeks, 87% of Shoalhaven’s entire road network can be assessed for defects, with the council able to rectify a record 10,688 defects over just three months.

“With a staggering number of defects being detected by only six trucks, we relied on TechnologyOne’s Enterprise Asset Management solution to provide a rating on a scale from zero to 10 to help our team of 76 field workers tend to the most urgent ones quicker,” McIntyre said.

TechnologyOne’s Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) solution is accessible from any browser or any device using a browser, and the triaged data from Retina Visions can be consumed directly into the TechnologyOne asset management system. The asset repair jobs created include location data, work instructions, maps and photographs. Once the defect has been tended to, the crew can close the job and include images of the completed work.

“TechnologyOne and Retina Visions made it easier for us to efficiently monitor, plan and prioritise the maintenance of our road network, which is more than 1700 km, for the benefit of the community,” McIntyre said.

TechnologyOne’s CEO, Ed Chung, said the Australian technology company has worked with councils for 36 years and understands the community focus that every local government has.

“It’s outstanding to see two homegrown tech companies with deep knowledge of how local governments work and a shared understanding of their priorities collaborate and innovate,” he said. “We understand that liveability and community safety are at the top of the list for councils globally, which is why I’m so proud to see our asset management solution supporting Shoalhaven City Council’s recovery from recent natural disasters and deliver safer quality roads and assets to its residents and visitors.”

Image credit: iStock.com/Artem Zakharov