Croke Park to trial futuristic fan experience

Croke Park has experienced many historic moments in its lifetime but none so futuristic as being able to view game highlights from your stadium seat.

Or how about ordering something to eat and having it delivered to you without having to miss that key moment or the match or battle crowds throughout the game or concert?

Now Croke Park is beaming into the 21st Century — quiet literally. Enhanced fan experiences are going to be made possible in the near future as part of a unique transatlantic alliance between Arizona State University (ASU) Sun Devil Stadium and Dublin City University (DCU) teams in collaboration with Intel and the GAA.

The partnership will use Croke Park and Sun Devil Stadium as living labs to test the capabilities of Internet of Things (IoT) technologies.

Croke Park Stadium holds 82,300 spectators and is the fourth largest stadium in Europe.

The goal is to use technology to enrich the live experience, as well as to improve safety and emerg-ency response, crowd movement and control, and traffic management.

A research team, led by Dr Sethuraman Panchanathan of ASU and Professor Noel O’Connor of DCU, will use both stadiums for the application of IoT technologies.

The stadiums will also facilitate collaborations for researchers, start-ups and entrepreneurs to bring their business ideas to market.

Prof O’Connor explained: “Stadiums, which attract tens of thousands for both sporting events and concerts, are a microcosm of cities.

“University research teams and companies can get feedback on their technology so it is ready for mass-scale use. Irish businesses can test their product at both Croke Park and the Sun Devil Stadium, and both have different markets.

“We will have research emerging from DCU, which we will deploy at the site.

“The concept will help academic researchers to bridge the research to practice gap that currently hampers the translation of IoT innovations out of labs into real deployments”.

It is envisaged that the project will lead to the development of apps to give data on air quality and noise levels.

Croke Park stadium director Peter McKenna, “A lot of innovation is happening here. We want to manage queues, provide additional information to fans, allow them to order food from their seats, etc.”

Dr Panchanathan of ASU said the partnership was an excellent example of how industry and academia can work together across different continents.