Monday, October 6th, 2025
AI & Digital Twins Webinar Series #4 – 17 July 2025
On 17 July, ALICE hosted the fourth session of its AI & Digital Twins webinar series, spotlighting the development of an open-architecture Urban Digital Twin (UDT) for the city of ’s-Hertogenbosch (Netherlands). The event showcased how modular, real-time digital systems can support urban sustainability, logistics efficiency, and smarter planning across European cities.
The UDT presented in the session is part of a broader research and innovation initiative led by JADS and Eindhoven University of Technology, with support from the LOKET project (Living Lab for Smart City Development). The system integrates real-time traffic, weather, air quality, and noise data through open APIs, and displays this information in an interactive 3D city model designed for accessibility and adaptability.
One of the standout features was a conversational AI interface (“ODIN”) that allows users, such as planners, logistics operators, and public officials, to query complex urban datasets in natural language. This chatbot is connected to an InfluxDB and Apache Kafka backend and demonstrates how AI can make urban data more transparent and usable.
The webinar also addressed key challenges, including limited environmental sensor coverage, the need for scalable simulations, and data governance issues. The team shared how synthetic datasets were used to model emissions impacts during a long-term construction project, offering insights into how digital twins can support predictive planning and emissions mitigation.
Moderated by David Cipres (ITAINNOVA), the session sparked a lively discussion around replicability, stakeholder engagement, and the role of Urban Digital Twins in transforming logistics flows, especially in congested or high-impact urban zones.
The project’s open-source code and deployment documentation have been made available for other cities or organisations to explore and adapt. ALICE members were encouraged to examine the model, engage with Thematic Groups 3 and 5 (TG3 and TG5), and contribute to ongoing conversations around AI, open data, and urban logistics innovation.
📄 A detailed summary report of the webinar, including architecture insights and policy implications, is available to ALICE members on the Knowledge Platform: [AI DT Webinar series #4] POST Webinar.pdf