[Docta_Love]

Interesting idea.

Oakland County turns to businesses to create connected vehicle infrastructure

By DUSTIN WALSH
Crain's Detroit Business
December 06, 2017


In its RFP to create a connected vehicle infrastructure to cover its nearly 5,600 miles of roadways, Oakland County encourages businesses to consider the collective of technologies that are already ready for implementation, including C-ITS.


-Oakland County issues RFP for connected vehicle infrastructure
-Goal is to create public-private partnership
-County would issue safety communications while partner found new revenue streams


Oakland County is turning to the corporate world for a plan to prioritize road safety while by creating a connected vehicle infrastructure to cover its nearly 5,600 miles of roadways.
The county issued a request for proposals late last month seeking bids from businesses, individually or as a collective, to create a system of short-range communication technology for use on the county's infrastructure, such as stop lights, etc.

Matt Gibb, deputy county executive, said the county hopes to control and own the system created by a private sector partner, where the county uses the connected infrastructure bandwidth to improve roadway safety, while allowing the third-party partner to create its own revenue streams.

"We're asking how we can monetize this data," Gibb said. "We feel this approach allows us to own the data and prioritize safety, but also license the infrastructure to an operator who then can find new ways to make it valuable."

The reason the county needs a third-party operator is simple: cost. Gibb estimates installing connected infrastructure, such as sensors, would cost the county $10,000 per intersection and about $40,000 per mile.

"I don't have $240 million to do this," Gibb said. "That's why companies like (General Motors Co.) are bypassing connectivity in favor of autonomous because governments are moving too slow. But we have cooperation among government entities (in the county) and we're trying to figure out whether we can monetize the network in a way that a public-private partnership pays for itself."

The county is looking for solutions to that question from the private sector, but Gibb believes some possible ideas include a subscription service that could include dedicated connected vehicle commuter lanes or advertising-based push notifications to drivers.

"If you could pay a modest fee to cut your commute, would you? What if you could pay $2 a month and get deals from that Starbucks before you hit that traffic jam that both save your commute time and money?," Gibb speculated. "But really this is about putting Oakland County ahead of the curve on this technology. If the government mandates that we have to send safety warnings to vehicles, what are we going to do? How the hell do we pay for it? Unless we find a revenue stream, we're going to get clobbered."

http://www.crainsdetroit.com/article...nected-vehicle