OTEC Presentation

For those of you finding this website as a result of my presentation today at the Ohio Transportation Engineers Conference I’d like to give you my presentation and notes. Feel free to go out to Slideshare and download the presentation and use it according to CC licensing. Thanks for attending the event and feel free to contact me here if you’d like to collaborate on an engagement event for your development project.

Session notes:

Slide 1 This presentation is about using online social networks to grow community engagement in public transportation projects. I presented this to the audience at the Ohio Transportation Engineers Conference on October 27, 2009 in Columbus Ohio.My time is short today so I’m hoping to inspire you to think a little differently about social media and how you might use it in your transportation and development projects.

Slide 2 Here are some quick facts associated with social media use here in Central Ohio. According to Neilson Internet Ratings Columbus Ohio ranked 6th in social media use among the largest US cities. We are a community that has embraced social media. In every news cast you hear mention of Twitter and Facebook, most likely some of the organizations you belong to are trying to reach out to you through their blogs and Facebook pages. In fact, Facebook is so popular that we are approaching half a million users in Central Ohio which is about one third of the population.

Slide 3 As I’m sure you’ve all noticed, the Central Ohio region has zero passenger rail service right now, light rail or otherwise. I chose to post up this image created by a user named Th0m on a local website called the Columbus Underground or CU. Columbus Underground is a community site where articles about events and community issues are posted and discussed. The site has a major following and frequently is the genesis for ideas that turn into action in and around our city. I’ll talk about a couple of those in a moment but first let me tell you about this map that Th0m created and why I believe it is important.You see, Th0m is not a trained engineer, he isn’t a traditional advocate who is coming to every transportation meeting; he is just a person interested in seeing light rail come to Central Ohio and he knows how to link up railway lines. Th0m took a look at Google Maps and found existing rail lines through out our community that were in convenient locations for people to get to them. He then drew up this map.His intention was to create a visual product that people who were working to make light rail a reality could focus on. The Columbus Underground is a hot bed of people who are so interested in seeing their community become what they want it to become; something better than it is today, that they are freely creating data mashups and other content to help bring about the changes they desire.

Slide 4 As I mentioned the Columbus Underground has been the start point of many actions related to transportation and development issues here in Central Ohio. The first one I became involved with happened sort of involuntarily. On May 30, 2008 my motorcycle, along with many others, was issued a parking ticket for parking in Pearl Alley in downtown Columbus. We were all parked illegally and we knew it but for a long time the city turned a blind eye because we weren’t in anyone’s way and it was a small group of us. Unfortunately, with gas prices soaring, the numbers of motorbikes parking illegally became a problem with doors being blocked and the like.For those of us who were ticketed we knew that there was no reason that a motorbike should take up a full car parking space (and thus pay the same amount) a thus network of riders and transportation activists formed primarily through online social networks like the Columbus Underground. Two days later a face to face meeting was held which included city representatives and local business owners. Local motorbike and scooter clubs spread the message online and off about the parking issue, social networking sites like the Columbus Underground quickly grew the numbers in the Community of Interest and a blog was setup to keep everyone updated with the latest information. This rapid mobilization of the COI and a willingness to work with the city to find a solution instead of expecting the city itself to do all of the heavy lifting resulted in permanent, officially sanctioned motorbike parking throughout downtown Columbus and its busy neighborhoods. All of this took place by July 17, 2008 – about one and a half months from start to end.

Slide 5 The COTA Challenge started with a local blogger named Jeff Johnson and eventually became a regular fixture of the Columbus Underground community for a year or so here. Essentially the idea started as a self imposed challenge (and something to write about) where Jeff would use only COTA, walking and bicycling for the month of January – seemingly the hardest month to do such a thing. By the end of the month Jeff had realized how much money he had saved and how much time he had to do other things besides driving.By using social media to document his challenge he inspired many more people to take on the challenge and even built some events around the challenge. This wasn’t sponsored by COTA and certainly didn’t come out of COTA’s marketing department – this was just a single rider who wanted to share how he was making his life and his commute better.All in all the project was a success but imagine where something like this could have gone if, after a groundswell of grassroots support had started COTA then embraced it and expanded upon it? As best as any of us know COTA probably doesn’t even know the COTA Challenge existed because they’ve never come out to our networks to acknowledge it. I think this is a missed opportunity.

Slide 6 I had the pleasure of meeting with Eric Gordon, the creator of Hub2, at the Communicative Cities conference a few months ago. Eric has created a system of using online role playing to let stakeholders virtually live in the redevelopment, interact with it, and make suggestions without bringing in one bulldozer onto the site. What Eric and his team discovered was that the quality of suggestions were exponentially better than a standard charet or open public meeting and that many of the participants walked away with excitement about the project because they felt they had “lived” it already. The concepts were much less abstract than before and these stakeholders became spokespeople for the project because of this excitement.

Slide 7 Two indispensible tools for transportation engineers and transportation users alike in this connected world are Google Maps and iPhone Apps (or just in general smartphone apps). Google Maps allow for use of the API to design highly personalized map functions and to overlay Google Maps with very useful general consumption features such as bus routes, etc. Smartphone application developers are now finding ways of making already incredibly useful applications even more useful by developing them specifically for the mobile user.When I was thinking about this presentation, about all of the current apps out there, things like the Hub2 project and all of the community participation I got to thinking about applications I might find useful or interesting. What if you took the Hub2 concept and allowed someone to stand, facing an area slated for redevelopment and using their iPhone as a sort of lens they could see a virtual version of the new site that shifted as they moved based on the phones lens and GPS? Taking it one step further, what if the user could stand there and move certain objects around using their touchscreen, just to see how it impacted the proposed development?What applications could you think of?

Slide 8 I always like to end with a little mention of Creative Commons licensing. Unless you are a professional expecting to get paid for certain content that you are developing I find that using Creative Commons licensing is a great way to grow your networks. Even as a professional it is possible to use this licensing scheme to both make money and share. Social media, even through something a simple as posting a picture with Creative Commons license, is a powerful tool for growing your network of supporters. Letting your supporters reuse your data can create a large network of support you may not otherwise have enjoyed, and it might lead to some really innovative thinking. Consider what sharing might mean for your next project.