Digital Infrastructure

The vision of this pillar is the development of a world-class digital infrastructure across Fingal, ensuring that both rural and urban Fingal are equipped with a fit-for-purpose digital infrastructure.

This pillar focuses on four key objectives:

•       Facilitate the development high-speed broadband and digital infrastructure.

•       Develop and enhance access to wireless connectivity.

•       Develop smart infrastructure to drive efficiencies and improve services.

•       Promote data-sharing capabilities and data driven services.

Objective: Facilitate the development of high-speed broadband and digital infrastructure

Where we are now

One of the biggest obstacles in digital development is the lack of high-speed broadband and digital infrastructure. Although we have seen significant investment in fibre cable and mobile telecommunications from commercial investment in recent years, there is still a rural-urban divide in broadband services within the County. The National Broadband Plan has been set up to address the digital divide in rural communities and bring high-speed broadband to every home in Ireland.

With regard to telecoms infrastructure, Fingal is better served than its more rural neighbouring counties, but it still experiences a rural-urban divide for high speed broadband services which has left rural communities disadvantaged for their living and working requirements. Latest figures available from the DCCAE (Q3-2019 - Table 1) show just under 9% of premises have no access to reliable high-speed broadband services.

What we aim to achieve

Fingal County Council is committed to developing and improving the county’s digital infrastructure and services. A Broadband Officer has been appointed to oversee the county’s connectivity infrastructure. The role of Broadband Officer is to provide a local point of contact for telecoms operators and the public regarding telecoms issues. They will also play the leading role as the National Broadband Plan is rolled out in Fingal.

Objective: Develop and enhance access to wireless connectivity

Where we are now

Fingal County Council currently provides free wireless connectivity in the Council Offices in Swords and Blanchardstown and in Fingal Libraries.

The Council plans to improve its WiFi infrastructure to deliver faster and more reliable connectivity to these public buildings.

In 2019, the Council launched Fingal Public WiFi Roadmap. This plan outlines a roadmap to deliver high-speed public WiFi hotspots to Fingal towns and villages. Phase 1 of the Fingal Public WiFi Roadmap include the implementation of a free public WiFi scheme by commercial operators. The Council is engaging with commercial operators to explore the feasibility of industry to provide free public WiFi in our major town centres - where it is commercially viable for them to provide service to the public. In April 2018, Magnet Networks launched Balbriggan Town Centre WiFi under this commercial operator scheme.

What we aim to achieve

Access to free public WiFi in our major town centres and villages will be a major asset to our visitors, businesses and residents. The Digital Strategy Survey found that access to free public WiFi scored highest overall as a project that should be prioritised. The development of a public WiFi plan for Fingal (Appendix D) shows the planned developments over the next 18 months.

The introduction of this service will strengthen Fingal’s reputation as a forward thinking and digitally inclusive urban and rural landscape, which strongly promotes access to on-line services and information across the county. The key aims of the Council’s WiFi project are to:

• Provide free public access to internet services at key destinations in major town centres and villages.

• Promote Fingal as a forward-thinking and digitally inclusive region.

• Introduce free public WiFi as an aid to foster economic growth, making Fingal a more attractive destination for citizens, business and visitors.

• Increase public access to on-line services and information.

• Work with industry to promote investment in digital infrastructure.

You can see the full version of Fingal’s Public WiFi Plan in Appendix D of this document.

Objective: Develop smart city infrastructure to drive efficiencies and improve services

Where we are now

Digitalisation, in a Smart City region context, is the capturing of analogue data of everyday life by means of suitable sensors and their transfer into digital information which can be further processed by electronic means. Everyday examples of this type of digitalisation can be found all around us, for example: real-time transport data on Google Maps, live car parking information displaying free car park spaces and live information at Dublin Bus stops. Fingal is currently trialling a number of Smart assets including;

• Solar compactor waste bins

• Electric car charging street lights

• Electric vehicle fleet

• Smart benches

• Bike sharing scheme

• Car sharing scheme

• Car parking app

• Smart water fountains

• Smart energy management

What we aim to achieve

As part of the Digital Strategy for Fingal, the Council is developing Smart Infrastructure pilot projects.

The aim of these projects is to showcase digital innovation and make improvements to street furniture in Fingal.

In 2019 the Council was successful in securing funding from the Department of Rural and Community Development’s Digital Innovation Programme to develop a smart street furniture project in Fingal.

This project will see the rollout of 15 benches across 8 towns and villages including high-speed WiFi hotspots.

The benches include smart features such as; digital signage, IOT environmental sensors, solar panels, wireless phone charging and free public WiFi.

Other Smart Infrastructure projects the Council is currently developing include: retro-fitting street light columns with electric car charging points, installing bicycle counting sensors, asset tagging life buoys and installing solar compactor waste bins.

Objective: Promote data-sharing capabilities and data driven services

Where we are now

In order to build a ‘Smart’ county you need access to intelligent data.

Fingal County Council was an early adopter of Open Data.

In November 2010 Fingal County Council launched Fingal Open Data - Ireland’s first Open Data portal data.fingal.ie.

The following year, the four Dublin local authorities came together to produce Dublinked, providing open data from the Dublin region on data.smartdublin.ie.

In 2014 the national open data portal, data.gov.ie, was launched by the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform (DPER).

Fingal County Council was an active partner in this initiative and remains involved in an advisory capacity.

The Council was also involved in the development of the National Open Data Strategy for 2017-2022 which was published by DPER in July 2017.

The goal of this strategy is for Ireland to become a leader in open data and to create an environment where the economic, social and democratic benefits of open data are recognised and realised.

What we want to achieve

Fingal’s open data site has four principal objectives:

• Transparency – citizens can access the data that assists the Council and other public sector bodies in making decisions. Citizens can also use this data for additional social value.

• Participation – citizens can increase their participation in the county of Fingal by using the data to analyse issues, to propose new ideas, to gain an insight into local government and to enrich their lives and their community.

• Economic Development - citizens and businesses are encouraged to use this data to produce apps, websites or other useful products, and to support decision-making processes.

• Collaboration – citizens and businesses are encouraged to suggest ideas about additional data that could be published, what applications or services could be built using the data and how access to the data might be improved by contacting [email protected]

The Fingal Digital Strategy aims to build on the progress of Fingal Open Data, Dublinked and the National Open Data platform to increase data sharing capacity throughout the Council in order to unlock the potential of Fingal’s data.

Studies have shown that Open Data has become an enabler for innovation and knowledge in today’s world. Access to official, open format non-personal data supports more effective decision-making, increases transparency of public spending and empowers citizens to take a more active role in their communities.

The Council will continue its efforts in releasing high-value data sets and promote a culture of transparency and openness.

To do this we will provide Open Data awareness training to staff, showcase Fingal’s Open Data with workshops and hackathons and encourage an open-by-default culture throughout the organisation.

Fingal has appointed an Open Data Liaison Officer to work closely with Council departments to encourage and enable the publishing of Fingal County Council data to Open Data platforms.

Fingal aims to improve the quality of its data by conducting an Open Data audit in collaboration with Smart Dublin.

We will review all data sets and create standardised data across the four Dublin Local Authorities.

We will strive to produce better quality, accessible data with the creation of visualisation dashboards, displaying user-friendly data.

PRIORITY DELIVERABLES