Pittsburgh Announced As Finalist In Smart Cities Challenge
PITTSBURGH (KDKA)- Pittsburgh has been named one of seven finalists in the "Smart Cities Challenge."
The U.S. Department of Transportation announced the finalists on Sunday.
The "Smart Cities Challenge" is a federal initiative that provides the winning city with $50 million to build technology-based systems to address the city's transportation and transit challenges.
Nearly 80 cities applied for the contest back in February.
Pittsburgh is competing against Austin, Texas, Columbus, Denver, Kansas City, Portland and San Francisco.
For making it as a finalist, Pittsburgh was awarded $100,000 to finalize its application, which is due in April.
The cities will use that money to further develop their concepts and the winner will be announced in June.
The application for Pittsburgh was a team effort by the city, county, Carnegie Mellon University, the University of Pittsburgh, the Port Authority and various non-profit organizations.
The Pittsburgh application would build upon existing work by the Traffic21 and Metro21 Initiatives at CMU. It utilizes adaptive transportation systems that evolve over time as technologies improve. If Pittsburgh wins, it would pilot "Smart Spines" that use new sensor information and controls that would gather data on major city transportation corridors.
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