The IDS Scaled Smart City (IDS3C)

Overview

The IDS Scaled Smart City (IDS3C) is a cyber-physical testbed developed by the Intelligent and Distributed Systems (IDS) Lab, which occupies a 400 square feet area and includes 70 robotic cars at a 1:25 scale and 12 quadcopters. It is designed to study coordination and control of intelligent transportation systems in a controlled yet realistic environment. The platform integrates connected and automated vehicles (CAVs), human-driven vehicles (HDVs), infrastructure, and aerial systems into a unified experimental framework.

The scaled city enables real-time experimentation on traffic coordination, decision-making under uncertainty, and human–AI interaction. It provides a bridge between theoretical algorithm design and physical validation, allowing for rapid prototyping and deployment of control and learning-based methods.

Demo Videos

Baseline controller.
This video presents the scaled city experiment under the baseline controller.

Coordination controller.
This video presents the scaled city experiment under the coordination controller.

My Contributions

Scaled City Maintenance and Operation

Took primary responsibility for maintaining the IDS Scaled Smart City as a reliable experimental platform.
Supported daily operation, including system setup, monitoring, experiment assistance for lab members.
Diagnosed and resolved hardware and software issues to ensure stable and reproducible experiments and demonstrations.

Vehicle Controller Integration and Tuning

Integrated existing coordination and baseline controllers into newly designed cars
Ensured compatibility between controllers and the physical vehicle platform
Participated in the design and tuning of PID controllers to improve tracking and control performance

Drone Integration

Contributed to integrating drones into the scaled city framework
Supported system-level connectivity between aerial agents and the existing platform
Assisted in enabling future experiments involving both ground vehicles and drones