April 5, 2007 -- CBC News -- The CitySense project will install 100 wireless sensors across Cambridge, Mass., over the next four years, Harvard announced on Thursday.
The group also plans to make the project open-source, meaning researchers across the world will be able to access information collected by the sensors.
"Wireless sensor networks have the potential to revolutionize the real-time monitoring of the environment, civil structures, roadways and animal habitats," said Harvard computer science assistant professor Matt Welsh in a statement.
"This will be one of the largest projects of its kind, and the entire 100-sensor infrastructure will eventually be open to anyone with a computer and an internet connection."
Welsh and his team hope to place 20 sensors atop streetlights throughout the city within two years, 50 by the third year and all 100 sensors after four years.
The sensors will initially be limited to collecting meteorological data: temperature, wind speed, rainfall, barometric pressure and air quality.
But the researchers hope eventually to equip them with biosensors to monitor air pollution and microphones to study noise pollution.
"We think this can be more than a sensor network test bed for scientists across the country who want to design their own city-wide experiments," said Welsh. "We also believe the network as a whole could provide the groundwork for cities looking to install universal wireless internet."
Harvard intends to open the data from the network for public use.
"An atmospheric science researcher in Tulsa or a 10th grade high school teacher in San Francisco would only have to design an experiment and sign up for a time slot to run it on CitySense," he said.
Harvard and its partners — Cambridge-based BBN Technologies and the city — said the project will create the world's first citywide network, but a number of private companies have already set up similar wireless networks across the United States.
Wi-Fi networks to connect internet users remotely have already been established in a number of large North American cities, including Toronto.
U.S. companies Traffic.com and SpeedInfo both provide information on traffic conditions and congestion from a network of wireless radar sensors, and U.S.-based WeatherBug compiles weather information through a network of 8,000 tracking stations.
SpeedInfo recently announced it has installed 50 solar-powered trafic sensors atop streetlights and posts in the District of Columbia.
The emergence of a new array of sensors on city streets raises concerns about privacy and the use of this information. But SpeedInfo chief executive Doug Finlay told the Associated Press on Thursday his company's sensors aren't equipped with cameras and are only used to determine larger trends in traffic speed.
"We don't have any way of determining who is going 100 miles per hour," he said. "We just know someone is."
