The future of drones in urban space
Representatives of the world of science, local governments and business met on June the 6th, 2025 at the airport in Gliwice to talk about the future of drones. All this thanks to the third edition of the Droniada Tech by Silesian University of Technology conference, which this year was held under the slogan “Air robotics: From prototyping to the economics of urban drone services.”
Droniada Tech by Silesian University of Technology is one of the paths of XII Droniada GZM 2025. It is organized for the third time by the Silesian University of Technology and the Micromacro Institute Foundation.
The conference brings together representatives of various environments interested in the development and implementation of innovative technological services in urban space.
- “Droniada Tech by Silesian University of Technology has always involved not only the scientific community, but also the local and business community” - explains Dr Eng. Roman Czyba, Prof. SUT, the organizer of the conference. - “During three discussion panels, we discussed the implementation of technological services in the urban space: Prototyping innovative solutions for smart cities, economic aspects related to the implementation of modern technologies, and above all, the development of the drone services market in local governments, including the drone model of the shared services centre. Experts from various fields took part in the discussions. We tried to determine the necessary technological competences for this centre. Silesian University of Technology and the Upper Silesian-Zagłębie Metropolis cooperate well, also in the field of drones, because GZM implemented, among others, “The Drones Over the Metropolis” program, in which our scientists participated. Municipalities are also interested in cooperation, to which the mentioned drone shared services centre would be addressed, so I hope that it will be built soon.”
The official opening of the event was attended by, among others, Vice-Rector for General Affairs of the Silesian University of Technology, Prof. Dr Hab. Eng. Bożena Skołud.
- “Such discussions are very important. As Silesian University of Technology, we cooperate with local governments and entrepreneurs. By organizing such events, we want to prove that the most important thing is to look to the future. Drones allow for this. Thanks to them, we can reach dangerous and hard-to-reach places and assess the threat during a fire by observing forests or cities. Here is a field to show off, especially for science” – says the Vice-Rector Bożena Skołud.
The event began with a lecture entitled “Prototype of the Ideal City. How to design a city open to social and technological innovation, a real smart city?” by the Dean of the Faculty of Architecture, Dr Eng. Arch. Tomasz Bradecki, Prof. SUT, who was considering how to design a city to implement innovative social and technological services. The conference was hosted by the head of the Academic Aviation Training Centre of the Silesian University of Technology, Dr Hab. Eng. Jarosław Kozuba, Prof. SUT.
- “Drones will use the common airspace of unmanned and pilot aircraft. It is a special machine operating at small and very small heights. Therefore, the role of cities in particular is to determine how these drones can be introduced into urban space so that they can perform their tasks, which are very numerous.” – says Prof. Jarosław Kozuba.
Drones are a flying robot that collects data and can help local governments. Therefore, during the conference we wanted to answer the question of how many competences of local governments of individual 41 municipalities belonging to the GZM in the field of data collection can go to the metropolitan level – explains Sławomir Kosieliński, President of the Foundation Mikromakro Institute, and the originator of Droniada
The video recording of the conference broadcast can be found here:
