Summary: For the past 7 years Aurash Khawarzad has been working in urban planning in Fairfax County, Virginia, and at the Project for Public Spaces in New York. He is currently adjunct faculty at Parson’s New School for Design, and a practicing planner. Aurash had some of his work exhibited at architectural biennales in Venice and Chile and San Francisco. TrafficCOM is a project that is being done in partnership with Tomorrow Lab. Holding data is power. These guys have chosen to build an open data business plan. We talk at length about the importance of having reliable traffic data widely available to anyone. Why count cars and bikes? Aurash gives the TrafficCOM origin story. For listeners familiar with traffic engineering projects, their intended audience may come as a surprise. Trusting regular people with open data TrafficCOM chose to create an open data business plan. The idea is for non-experts to be able to collect vehicle and bike counts, and post the information to interactive maps. It's the sort of approach that communities will appreciate. Aurash discusses the importance of making traffic data widely available. Connect with our guest Aurash Khawarzad is active on Twitter, but you should first check out the TrafficCOM Kickstarter page. Watch the short video and think about contributing. Also, be sure to check out Tomorrow-Lab, home of Aurash's business partner. Kickstarter Twitter Tomorrow Lab Sponsor Urbanism Speakeasy listeners: try Audible FREE for 30 days and get a FREE audiobook. Listen to audiobook while you use your very own TrafficCOM counter on a neighborhood street. Give Audible a try.
