What if we could point to any city and instantly surface its most pressing challenges?
That is the question we set out to answer in collaboration with graduate students in the University of Michigan School of Information (UMSI). UEI defined the project and the students did the work. UEI Strategy Associate Anshiqa Miskowski supervised the work of the UMSI students and managed the project. The result of this partnership is the Urban Insights Dashboard, an experimental prototype designed to map an urban community’s challenges based on data collected electronically, in real time. You can view the prototype dashboard at this link.
Our information source: the digital public square
To capture community insights, the dashboard taps directly into data from the social media site Reddit and analyzes localized city subreddits where residents openly discuss their daily lives. We chose to use Reddit because it’s akin to a public square, with organic, everyday-citizen dialog. By collecting and analyzing local conversations, we can capture community signals like infrastructure failures, housing concerns, public service problems, and economic anxieties exactly as residents experience them. The dashboard analyzes information posted by community members over the past four years.
Why build a tool like this?
The information provided by this tool can be a valuable resource for urban entrepreneurs who seek to create meaningful business solutions inspired by true local needs. The tool is not a substitute for deep firsthand community immersion and customer discovery. It can, however, point entrepreneurs, urban planners, and change-makers to hidden pain points and unmet needs within a community. Urban innovators and entrepreneurs can then dive deeper into a given area to validate and prioritize issues and explore solutions.
Where do we go from here?
We intend to keep exploring and building the Urban Insights Dashboard. We will look to incorporate more data sources and allow sensing of the conditions in any city, in real time. That is a tall order, and achieving the objective will require much more time and effort. We believe that the Urban Insights Dashboard can be a powerful, invaluable tool for those who wish improve the quality of life in urban communities.
What do you think?
If you haven’t done so already, check out the dashboard at this link. What do you think of the Urban Insights Dashboard project? Do you think the pursuit of a tool like this is worthwhile? What other sources of information might be a useful indicator of community sentiment?
