Open source government

by: Chris Bilton

March 25, 2009 9:00 PM

Comments: (2)

Last Monday, a great cry of joy emanated from Toronto’s transit-going public as the highly anticipated online GPS streetcar-tracking system, NextBus, went suddenly and unceremoniously live online. Well, OK; celebration was maybe limited to those who happened to be following larrylarry’s Twitter feed or cruising the Toronto blogs (or, god help them, trying to muck their way through www3.ttc.ca). As it turns out, the beta launch was but a premature leak, with all but two streetcar routes quickly removed from the home page. Moderate joy remains.

The TTC’s fleeting moment of scheduling grace, however, serves as a reminder of the painfully slow process of improving their website. Despite the Spadina streetcar tracker, text-message service updates and communications director Brad Ross’ tweets, the TTC’s site still lacks essential tools such as a trip planner, a useful, searchable route map and user-friendly navigability... you know, features that would nudge their online presence into the 21st century.

What’s more painful is that the current improvements are only barely beginning to capitalize on some of the ideas bandied about over two years ago at the first meeting of Transit Camp — a day-long gonzo symposium for citizen-based solutions to the TTC’s troubles. One of the overriding themes emerging from the event was that the general public is often knowledgeable and capable enough to improve certain aspects of government institutions — especially wherever the internet is involved. And, if you can believe it, they’re willing to do it for free.

Tech-savvy hobbyists like Ian Stevens, who created a TTC Google map mash-up by inputting the entire transit system’s route stops into a pre-existing map of the city, are out there just waiting for a chance to improve our municipal world for the greater good of Toronto’s citizenry. The only problem is that they need government agencies to give them information that they can work with.

If this stumbling block sounds familiar, it’s because overcoming it is one of Barack Obama’s key ideas for creating a modern and progressive US government. With a sort of open-source approach to information, Obama strives to “integrate citizens into the actual business of government” by making all kinds of data available in formats that people can use on their own websites or computer programs. So if you want to create a Google map of bedbug infestations or restaurants with health-code infractions, or simply need a bar graph on campaign spending for your first-year politics essay, his administration believes that access should be as easy as creating a blog. And slowly, they’re making it happen.

The notion of letting anybody run wild with government data may seem like the prelude to some kind of anarchic utopia, but it’s actually far less subversive. After all, environmental studies and transit schedules are public information that’s available anyway. What’s radical is that, by letting the general public manage the data, governments can capitalize on a massive talent pool to get better programming for next to no cost. Essentially, it’s a form of wikinomics — or mass collaboration.

Although Toronto pioneered the Transit Camp model, it’s Americans who’ve already incorporated solutions dreamt up there, as The Atlantic recently pointed out. When Google offered up their mapping technology as part of the Transit Partner Program, Portland’s TriMet and Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) in San Francisco were the first transit systems to make use of the opportunity. Both were quick to release their schedules and route information to Google in exchange for maps that now serve riders as part of their respective websites. BART has even gone so far as offering the technology to install real-time transit displays on any computer, so that offices and lobbies everywhere can serve as arm’s-length transit hubs.

The TTC’s website isn’t the only online public service that could benefit from mass collaboration. Anyone who’s been to the City of Toronto site recently may have noticed a few new features: a building development application database (Adam Vaughan’s website even goes so far as to provide pdf maps of locations in his ward) and DineSafe — a searchable catalogue of the health inspection records for every food-service establishment in the city. There are plans for a catalogue of all billboards in the city once the new sign bylaw comes into effect later this year.

This is all useful information — and searching the DineSafe site can be a fun/frightening way to kill an afternoon. But ultimately, by using these services you’re at the mercy of the city’s programmers and whatever website they have been commissioned to build. The interfaces are clunky and often confusing and, almost always, the sites are outdated by the time they are created. Without using the kind of rapidly developing open-source technology that comes from mass collaboration projects like Wordpress or YouTube, anything that’s built and maintained by one institution is doomed to frustrating obsolescence.

Traditional business logic would suggest that entrusting the evolution of, say, the TTC’s website to the general population would mean that the company would lose control over the content. But it’s a small sacrifice compared to the plethora of plug-in choices the TTC would have at its disposal if an entire city of Ian Stevenses were given free reign (or at least free information). After all, public transit is a form of mass collaboration. Think of this as a technological Better Way.

Copyright 1991 - 2010 EYE WEEKLY Newspapers Limited. All Rights Reserved. Distribution transmission,
Republication of any materials is strictly prohibited without the prior written consent of EYE WEEKLY.
EYE WEEKLY is a division of Toronto Star Newspapers Limited.

Municipal Affairs Desk

Open source government

Chris Bilton