Cities are constantly balancing tight budgets with growing infrastructure needs. One Somerville, Massachusetts-based company says artificial intelligence will make these decisions easier and cheaper.
At Cyvl’s lab, engineers use AI to create maps and measure road conditions so cities can get a clearer picture of what’s happening on every street.
Cyvl’s technology uses cameras and sensors installed in vehicles to collect road data. That information is analyzed by AI to identify defects, measure road damage, and help cities decide when to address problems.
“The type of crack is a very subtle detail, but it may tell you if you should fix it now or later,” said Daniel Pelaez, co-founder and CEO of Cyvl.
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Pelaez said the company’s focus is on providing better and more up-to-date information to governments and leveraging AI to make sense of the information.
“What’s important to us is how do we use technology to give governments newer data about what they have, and how do we apply AI and software to sift through that data and help governments make decisions,” he said.
The platform allows users to zoom in on road conditions and identify different types of deficiencies across cities, ultimately helping cities and towns manage and maintain their infrastructure.
“You can zoom all the way down the road and see, ‘What’s really going on here?'” Pelaez said, explaining how the program works. “So this pink color indicates alligator cracks, and the AI is automatically detecting four different types of defects.”
He said the technology will significantly speed up data collection.
“Usually this section would take me maybe 30 minutes to write everything out by myself, but this is just happening with cars driving around,” Palaes added. “Thanks to this information, we can say exactly how much asphalt needs to be laid and when it should be repaved.”
The platform can also catalog road defects as well as parking signs, benches, traffic cameras, etc. along with the status of each of those objects.
The company says it currently has more than 500 customers in the United States and Australia. The city of Boston is one of them.
“We’re showing that the city can work with all of its private sector partners to really push the boundaries of what’s possible and bring AI to life in ways that truly benefit people,” said Santiago Garces, Boston’s chief information officer.
Instead of relying on manual inspections and complaints, city officials will now have a clearer, data-driven understanding of road conditions across neighborhoods.
“We should be able to save some money by being more proactive and avoiding more catastrophic failures,” Garces said. “But it also helps us understand when we need to make large investments, where to place them, and how to time them in a fair, unbiased and timely manner.”
Cyvl and the City of Boston are currently expanding their partnership with a new website called AskBoston.ai.
The site launched on Monday and allows users to ask specific questions about a particular road or neighborhood and receive answers backed by actual inspection data from Cyvl and the city. Palaez said there may be some issues as the tool rolls out, but he encourages people to try it out and share their feedback.
