Recently the Rotterdam Kuip hosted the kick-off of the NWO project AI Compass. In this project, 27 governments, companies and universities are working on crowd management systems that are not only smart but also ethical, and in which humans remain emphatically in charge. The project runs until the end of 2028.
During the kick-off, which was attended by some 50 people, the participating parties were able to get to know each other and the core team. But the main goal was to reiterate the project itself. Many partners work in sub-projects, but in the end everything has to come together.
Five subprojects
One of the total of five subprojects, explained project manager Tina Comes of TU Delft, is the development of a unique, predictive crowd management system. Such a system supports police and municipalities in monitoring and, where necessary, "adjusting" large crowds during, for example, King's Day, a marathon or a busy summer day on a boulevard.
In doing so, the new system will use artificial intelligence, AI. This is socially sensitive - and rightly so. Comes: "There are concerns about privacy, but especially about the transparency of AI. For example, how do you know that the AI does not discriminate? We therefore focus on precisely those concerns in four of the five subprojects. We are developing and testing protocols, design principles and tools to ensure that our AI-supported crowd management system is 100% ethical and legally sound. That's what makes it unique." AI Compass hopes to present its first results during 2025.
27 partners
Twenty-seven parties are participating in the project made possible by NWO: TU Delft, University of Groningen, Police, Ministry of Infrastructure and Water Management, Province of South Holland, the municipalities of Delft, The Hague, Dordrecht, Rotterdam and Sittard-Geleen, Inner City of The Hague, Safety Region Rotterdam-Rijnmond, NS, ProRail, RET, HTM, NEN, Connect, Future City Foundation, Argaleo, Capgemini, ELBA\REC, Feyenoord, Genetec, Nenova, Safesight, We Labs.
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