Türkiye collaborates with Japan to install smart infrastructure using IoT on high-speed railways to boost safety and respond to disasters and resilience in the long term.

Türkiye and Japan have announced a collaboration to improve the safety and surveillance in the high-speed rail network in Türkiye with the help of a superior smart infrastructure technology. The project will install the Japanese Zero Energy IoT Series monitoring system invented by OKI, which is already applied to the railways in Japan.

The system is also capable of identifying the case of infrastructure displacements and natural disasters like floods and landslides and this provides a powerful addition to the resilience and operational security. The Transport and Infrastructure Minister of Türkiye, Abdulkadir Uraloglu, remarked that the partnership was congruent with the idea of Turkish State Railways (TCDD) trying to incorporate the world's best practices and innovative smart infrastructure.

Later this year, the Polatli-Konya and Konya-Karaman-Ulukisla high-speed lines shall commence implementation. Monitoring will be a period of two years, after which data gathered will be interpreted to be integrated in the long run.

In addition to safety, the project also focuses on knowledge-sharing, as the Turkish engineers would collaborate with the Japanese experts to create localized (technological) solutions. With the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry of Japan behind it, the partnership will help the two countries improve their skills in rail monitoring.

As pointed out by Uraloglu, the project proves that Türkiye is interested in the development of smart infrastructure via rail but also in building local engineering capacity. The project establishes a model for sustainable railway development driven by innovations in a more global partnership.