Transcript 0:00 [on-hold music] Talk to me. Information, news and entertainment on demand. summarywestradio.com [upbeat music] 0:14 Welcome to The Peggy Smedley Show, the voice of IoT in our connected world, with your host, Peggy Smedley. [upbeat music] Hello, listeners, and welcome back to The Peggy Sledley Show. 0:26 My next guest is a monthly regular on the show, and he conducts research in the area he has founded called Human Infrastructure Interaction. 0:35 He focuses on the understanding, design, and evaluation of smart and resilient infrastructure systems. 0:42 Please join me in welcoming Joshua Peschel, Assistant Professor of Agriculture and Biosystems Engineering at Iowa State University. Josh, welcome to the show. Hey, Peggy. It's great to be back with you this month. 0:56 Hey, Josh. Let's talk a little bit about America's infrastructure. I've, I've been talking about, uh, the ASCE's, uh, report card, and I'm sure you heard America's infrastructure got a whopping D plus. 1:10 And I was just saying most of us, if we got a D plus in school, I think we'd, uh, be-- our parents would be less than pleased. 1:17 So I, I guess I'm curious, you know, you do a lot of work in a lot of different areas, ag and robotics and things like that. 1:24 What are you seeing, you know, looking at just being in Iowa and things like this and just your thoughts overall across the Midwest, the country in general, um, what's your take as we need to do, or what do you think, uh, the infrastructures we're trying to rebuild it? 1:41 Well, first of all, I'd agree with you. I think if that report card came home, you'd have some pretty unhappy parents, um, and we'd be, you know, looking for, for ways to get around that. 1:51 And I, and I think that, you know, when I, when I look at these infrastructure problems, I, I look at them in terms of, uh, structural problems and functional problems. 2:00 And so if we're talking about structural problems, these are the things that, you know, there maybe weren't some rules or regulations or expectations. There aren't any benchmarks. 2:08 Um, and sometimes these things catch us by surprise. When we talk about functional problems, this is where maybe error, violations, policies, you know, violation of design assumptions, things like that come into play. 2:21 And both of those have immediate needs and eventual needs. 2:26 And so the worst place to get caught is in the case where you might have something like a structural problem that has an immediate need because we really just weren't ready for it. 2:35 Okay, that's kind of the bad place to be. When we have functional problems and we have eventual needs, I'm not saying it's perhaps all that better, but at least there's some planning that can go into it. 2:46 And so in terms of, you know, very tangible examples that we might have here in the Midwest, I mean, I think that you could go through the whole, 2:54 um, you know, presentation of all the mater-- uh, from transportation to wastewater treatment to, um, those, those types of infrastructure needs. 3:05 I don't, I don't think that we're necessarily immune from any of those problems. I think this is more or less a generalized problem across the entire country. And so 3:15 the biggest thing that I see as a problem with, with all of this is that there really isn't a one-size-fits-all solution to all of those problems geographically. 3:26 Um, the impacts of all of these issues on the infrastructure, whether it be economic or political, social, are gonna be as variable geographically, uh, as they are as it relates to the origin of the problem itself. 3:38 And so I, I think that that's kind of our, our big challenge with dealing with this infrastructure problem. 3:45 So is it when you talk about, like, political, social, kind of bringing that to the functional, structural kind of thing, is it going to come down to us having to tax our way out of it, you know, to fund it? 3:58 Is that going to be the thing that's gonna-- that it's going to lead us to this, to solve this kind of a problem? 4:06 Well, that's a great question, and one that is often, you know, talked about on, on, uh, every television [chuckles] news program for, for many years now. 4:15 Uh, and there, there's obviously different political philosophies on, on how you should do that. I think the fact of the matter is, is that, is that there's a bill and it has to be paid. 4:25 People will argue over how that's gonna get done, but I think at the end of the day, it, it's got to be paid, and it's, you know, it's the-- it's effectively the infrastructure credit card that just continues to roll every month. 4:37 And so I think that 4:42 it-- politically right now in the country to say that, that, you know, you'll get a, you know, infrastructure tax increase is probably not something that's gonna be politically viable in a, in a large portion of the country. 4:56 And so it's probably gonna take some of those public-private partnerships that we've talked about in the past to try to introduce new revenue streams to, to accommodate some of the areas of infrastructure. 5:08 Some areas of infrastructure are more-- they lend themselves more towards, um, partnering with, with a private entity. 5:15 Let's say example-- an example would be roadways, where you have, you know, private companies that come in and manage tollways. This has been done in Texas and in different places. 5:26 Uh, but then you get into an area like water. 5:29 Well, water is one of those things that people just expect to be there, and they expect it to be good, and, and really the cost in itself isn't something that's, that's, uh, you know, people think about. So, um, 5:43 I think, I think that, again, I go back to what I said in the beginning, the variability of the solution. You know, we often talk about the cost. Yeah, we got to pay the bill. But it's really 5:54 embracing the fact that there's a lot of variability in how this is actually gonna get done. 5:59 And it may be as unique as the towns themselves that dot across the landscape of the United States.And that's the interesting thing. Do you think... 6:07 And, and one of the things that I was asking, um, the president of the ASCE when I had her on the last segment is, do you think that we can get enough of these, let's say, technology companies to wanna partner, let's say, with construction companies or the, the, the 6:24 tech companies to work together in this public-private way to maybe help us with our skill labor shortage? 6:32 To kind of be more creative, innovative, to think outside the box so that we can develop these new young minds to wanna be in construction companies, to be able to find new, innovative ways to solve all these problems that we're talking about that, that, that we have with what we're dealing with. 6:51 I think the short answer is yes, but it depends. 6:54 I think if you're talking about cities like Chicago and Seattle and Boston and Houston, Dallas, large areas where if you do have this partnership, it's a, it's a very large targeted area, so you get a lot of bang for your buck. 7:08 I, I... Mu- just myself, I've participated in, in partnerships exactly like you're, you're talking about with technology companies partnering with large urban municipalities, i-in particular Chicago. 7:20 Um, but I think that the other side of that is what we're not talking enough about, and that's the small and connected communities. 7:27 All of the space outside of those major metropolitan areas, um, that, that, you know, the small and interconnected communities that don't have the resources and perhaps by themselves individually wouldn't be, you know, a town of five thousand people wouldn't be as attractive to companies to make investments in as, as somebody... 7:48 some place like Chicago that would have millions of people. And so you're dealing with sort of the issue of scale. 7:54 But I think there is a positive way to go about looking at those small communities and looking at them sort of collectively and, and developing solutions, um, amongst those municipal governments, but having technology companies go out and look at them sort of en masse to see if there aren't, um, some, some common ground, if, if there's not some common ground to deal with some of those perhaps smaller scale municipal problems. 8:22 We've got just about, uh, thirty seconds left, Josh. Looking at it right now, what do you think we're gonna see? You know, the next report card comes out in a few years. You see we're gonna see some improvement? 8:33 What do you think? 8:35 I think if we get some advancements in material science, so better roadway materials, I think if we get some advancements in cheaper construction methods, and I think if we get some advancements in service and maintenance, and that might well be the data too, then I think we'll be in a really good sha... 8:50 in, in a good shape and for the next report card. 8:53 But we're just gonna really have to make a fundamental commitment to paying the bill and innovating so that we can, um, you know, move forward and not just have band-aids, but have long-term solutions. 9:06 Hey, Josh, we love it when you have it on... when you're on the show. Assistant Professor of Agriculture and Biosystems Engineering at Iowa State University, thank you so much, and have a great Fourth of July. Thank you. 9:17 You too. All right, listeners, we're out of time. But you know what? Check out our website at connectedworld.com or check out thepeggySmedleyShow.com. 9:25 And as I'm suggesting, you can go up and check out our Technology Day on August twenty-third in Arlington Heights, Illinois. Check out more information on constructtech.com/tech-day/. 9:36 There's some great information, and you wanna learn about anything we just talked about, and you wanna learn more about how you can be a contributor to what all we're doing in infrastructure. That's the event to be. 9:46 Have a great week, and remember, we are coming to you live here on Construct Tech and Broadcast and Con-Connected World and The Peggy Smedley Show every Tuesday at twelve PM Central. 9:58 This is The Peggy Smedley Show, the broadcasting voice of IoT and relevant technology. Remember, with great technology comes great responsibility. [upbeat music] With great technology comes great responsibility. 10:13 Follow Internet of Things tech expert and futurist Peggy Smedley, repeatedly ranked as a top IoT and M2M influencer. 10:21 Go to peggy_smedley on Twitter for her take on the latest tech news and lively interviews with other industry insiders on her weekly radio show. Visit twitter.com and search for peggy_smedley to follow her today. 10:39 [upbeat music] Video consumption is on the rise. So to reach this audience, Construct Tech Magazine created Construct Tech TV. 10:48 Construct Tech TV helps construction professionals leverage emerging solutions to better their business. Tune in to constructtech.tv to catch the latest show on the first and third Tuesday of each month. 10:59 Like, view, and subscribe to constructtech.tv, bringing dynamic video to construction. [upbeat music] Signal to noise, an electronic term with new relevance on the internet. 11:14 Connected World Media cuts through the noise of data overload and finds you the signal of important information, information that will keep you current and aware of context in the Internet of Things. 11:25 Peggy Smedley shares her insights on The Peggy Smedley Show and in Connected World magazine, all online at connectedworld.com. Stay current and competitive at connectedworld.com [upbeat music] 11:38 Are you a small business or nonprofit? Securing Our eCity Foundation offers free cybersecurity seminars so businesses of every size can become more cyber safe. 11:48 According to Forbes, just one cybercrime incident can cost a company over fifteen million dollars. Protect yourself, your employees, and your business before you fall victim to the nation's fastest-growing crime. 12:00 Go right now to securingourecity.org or call six one nine six three zero two four four four. [upbeat music] Looking to be a successful entrepreneur? 12:11 The virtual assistant industry continues to be a top choice for those looking to start their own business. The problem can be, how to become a virtual assistant? 12:19 Many turn to the bible of the VA industry, the book Virtual Assistant: The Series, and it's the perfect guide for office managers, executive assistants, and other administrative professionals looking to make the transition from employee to successful business owner. 12:34 Go to vatheseries.com to get your copy today. [upbeat music] Education. Industry experts. Back to the basics. Is your company using the Internet of Things to its fullest potential? 12:45 Enlist the Peggy Smedley Institute and its team of experts to create a customized plan for how to apply the IoT to your specific needs. 12:53 Learn everything you need to know to achieve tangible business outcomes in today's digital economy. Contact us at six three zero nine three three zero eight four four. 13:02 That's six three zero nine three three zero eight four four, or visit learnatIoT.com.
