Published on November 18, 2020
Whether navigating urban spaces with different abilities, or simply seeking a walking or biking path that prioritizes specifications other than the quickest route and shortest distance, having access to standardized, comprehensive data about pedestrian pathways offers wide-ranging benefits.
However, this information is often difficult to find due to local variations in data collection, inconsistencies and limited data, and the prioritization of data on streets and cars rather than sidewalks and pedestrians in transportation network analyses and routing apps.
Dr. Anat Caspi, director of the Taskar Center for Accessible Technology at the University of Washington, leads an effort to establish consistent, detailed standards for tracking data about pedestrian paths and their connectivity within multimodal transportation networks, locally and beyond. Since 2015, Caspi and Nick Bolten, a Postdoctoral fellow in the Paul G. Allen School of Computer Science & Engineering, have been working with stakeholders on the OpenSidewalks project to improve the collection, organization and sharing of data on the built environment to promote equity and inclusivity in transportation. They track features such as curb ramps, accessible traffic lights, elevation changes and sidewalk quality, width and shoring, which are often omitted from transportation network data and routing apps.
Using this data, Caspi and Bolten developed AccessMap, a web application launched in 2017 that provides customized routing directions for pedestrians based on individual mobility profiles. The maps are available for three Washington cities: Seattle, Bellingham and Mount Vernon, where they have received over 35,000 routing requests. Expansion is underway, with data collection in progress in Austin, Texas and San Jose, California, and potential partners in Portland, Oregon.
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Originally written by Emily Keller for Urbanalytics.