NEW 21ST-CENTURY SMART CITY INFRASTRUCTURE

BY DARRIN MYLET

Every city would like more reliable, resilient, cyberEMP+, secure highspeed connectivity for current and future applications and needs, yet it is impossible for current companies to expand their networks both technically and financially. Telosa Networks provides cities with networks faster than old fiber and 1/100 the time and cost of new fiber with all the benefits of easy extension, resilient design, and backup power.

What is the foundation of a smart city? Having the ability to connect things is a good place to start, and that begins with the wireless spectrum. This is the local spectrum that’s mostly underutilized. The secret to what I believe creates the foundation for making your city smart starts with empty rooftops, one of the most underutilized assets in any city in the world. We have mostly airconditioning units and empty space.

21st Century Networks

Here’s an example of what I believe is the foundation for the 21st-century network: the ability to put radios, antennas, and solar panels on the rooftops. This allows us to create more connectivity without digging up the streets, causing carbon emissions, or trading one monopoly provider for another provider and having an open-access network. In Miami, we’ve been testing the world's fastest wireless link ever deployed. It is doing almost 400 gigabits per second at 1.1 miles, can go as far as 3 miles, and will eventually do 4 terabytes of data through the sky without having to dig up one street. It has the ability to put another technology up that can do a gigabit down, and it can connect to anything that it can see within 360 degrees. It’s a flywheel of connectivity for both public and private needs.

Wireless Fiber vs. Glass Fiber

The idea of the 21st-century network is that we connect and end the network in data centers. There are six data centers in Miami. More edge data centers will be built out. There’s also a lot of rage about fiber, but I don’t believe fiber is the answer. We should have some fiber in our diet, but it doesn’t need to be all of our diet when compared to putting in 100-, 200-, and 400-gig links that can go a mile.

Engage Data Center / Edge

You must engage the data center. This is where the compute and storage is. You can decentralize the infrastructure. You can have sustainable wind and solar. You can have smaller edge data centers and route all the traffic back to that site.

Enable Fast Wireless Fiber

The next thing is the ability to extend these high-capacity links to travel long distances. We installed equipment at 100 Biscayne in Miami, and we’re connecting Opera Tower. This link has been stable for nine months. We’re continually adding capacity to it, and we plan to expand that. It is very exciting. It has a lot of capabilities and is really 21stcentury technology.

Enable EMP+ Protection

As you start building these networks, you must enable 21st-century protection.

Network protection is very critical because of lots of known and unknown threats that will be coming. City systems are critical infrastructure, just like the grid.

EMP Shield protects against lightning, which we need because our network is in the sky, but also against cyberattacks, where they can send surges into the network and knock down RF attacks.

Enable Drone / Air Taxi Sites

As we think about moving forward into the 21st century, we should embrace what the smart cities visionary James Carlini said in his book on next-generation real estate: “20th-century solutions do not solve 21st-century challenges.” We should be looking at new innovation to solve 21st-century problems. Developing more efficient transportation is one of those challenges.

In Miami, six companies have announced they will be flying drones or air taxis. This is a more efficient solution to commuting to the airport. But as you look at the rooftops around our cities, there’s nowhere for them to land. A company called Drone Industry Systems has been working on developing the capability to put FAA-approved pads.

Enable Air Monitoring

Another important aspect of smart cities that networks enable is the ability to collect and report data. There is one EPA air-monitoring center in Miami for 6 million people. We need to replace those. We need to do it cheaper, and we need to be able to get the data to the iPhones or smart screens in cities.

Enable Many Technologies

Having the network in the sky allows intelligent traffic. How often are we driving around cities, sitting at a red light, and nobody is on the other side? It’s a timer. How do we replace the timers? You must have a network with cameras to see what’s happening in real time.

Gun detection is another amazing technology that smart cities can enable. Imagine you’re in a school, a schoolyard, a parking lot, a mall, or even on the main streets. If someone pulls a gun, the cameras can see it within a second and report it.

The Conclusion Is Clear

As we talk about public-private partnerships, think about each city that’s spending money on 20th-century networks. They can easily move that money to the next generation and have their own infrastructure or have a partnership with a local provider to fund it and make it sustainable.

What about local reinvestment? This is the time for every city to take advantage because technological innovation is there. Nothing is stopping it. You don’t need approval. You don’t need to ask the FCC for spectrum. And tremendous amounts of capital are coming into this new asset class, which is called digital infrastructure. And this is exactly what this is. This is digital infrastructure. It can be done one city, one county, and one state at a time.

Mylet

Darrin Mylet is the CEO of Telosa Networks, which is in the business of planning, building, and operating new local fiber, fixed wireless networks for buildings and cities using 21st-century technology, a data center, and edge compute architecture to enable smart cloud applications like digital twins, ITS, drone, and air taxi networks. Mylet served two terms (2010/11-President Obama) and (2009/10-President Bush) for the Department of Commerce Spectrum Management Advisory Committee administered by NTIA and was chairperson of the Wireless Spectrum Transparency Subcommittee.