Let's use data to make Ottawa better

Ottawa Traffic Camera interface

I have created a site that allows you to display multiple traffic cameras at once based on a street name filter. https://ottawawebcams.000webhostapp.com/

Improving collection of Ottawa's coyote data

The City currently collects data on coyote sightings using an online form (https://so311.serviceottawa.ca/selfserve/?reqId=2000190&lang=en). In its current iteration however, the form does not prompt the user for any details that will be useful to inform the 2023-planned development of a Coyote Management Plan. In reality, the fact that a Plan can be developed without yet having any of this information is a real concern. Modifications to the form to obtain specific data such as: - date, time, and duration of the interaction (is it mating or pupping season?) - type of interaction (i.e. sighting, encounter, incident, pet attack: Attended/Unattended, Human Attack, etc) - presence of attractants (garbage, intentional wildlife feeding, pet food) - if it involved a pet was the pet leashed? - human behaviour prior to and after the interaction and be worded carefully to avoid creating any potential bias (the form currently refers to a report of the "problem" and asks the user to explain the "issue").

Interactive Visualization of Bicycle Counters in Ottawa

Data from bicycle counters across Ottawa. There are 14 bicycle counters in Ottawa that track bicycle crossings on streets and bike paths. This visual app displays how daily counts change over time. Link: https://whipson.shinyapps.io/Ottawa_Bike_Counters/

https://infograph.venngage.com/ps/JprJTOw1GyQ/wallacethea_coms2200_infographick

An infographic on a case study demonstrating how large-scale construction makes the roads safer

PotSnap: Messenger based high speed pothole reporting

http://potsnap.ca/ https://www.facebook.com/PotSnap https://m.me/PotSnap https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/ottawa-pothole-reporting-fill-app-1.5073348 PotSnap is an Facebook Messenger based, automated pothole reporting tool. Potsnap is very simple to use. It only asks a few simple questions and then reports your pothole anonymously to the City of Ottawa. PotSnap is faster then any other means and hopes to be the tool of choice for Canada’s Pothole hunters. PotSnap is also a proof of concept of a first party tool, for the Universal Reporting System. It demonstrates the use of an independent API to service Endpoints with service requests, using the Open 311 framework provided by the City of Ottawa. The URT expands on the base provided by the City and provides richer feature set that focuses on reducing and eliminating common pain points for governance. Created by Citizen Softworks from Bayshore with ❤

The Former Landfills dataset is missing

The former landfill dataset from the old open data portal is no longer available (it seems it got lost in the move to the new portal). Can you please re-add? (it used to be here: http://data.ottawa.ca/dataset/former-landfills)

Open311 Documentation

Hello, I think the link to the documentation is broken: https://open.ottawa.ca/documents/open311-api

Expand the breadth and powers of Open Ottawa

Expand the focus from providing datasets to fostering innovation. Putting emphasis on: - Social services development and improvement though digtalization - Increasing accountability and trust though tech - Foster tourism and growth to the internal and external public image of ottawa - Promote civic minded development, focusing on quality of life and reducing the barriers to a healthy, happy and active civic life

Improve the URLs

The URL for construction projects is https://open.ottawa.ca/datasets/b2395e56baf148ee88eef9e20c43e12c_1/data. All those jumble of alpha-numeric characters are not intuitive. https://open.ottawa.ca/datasets/construction/data or similar would be much better

Parking near Fire Hydrants

It is very difficult to know even if you know how far to park from hydrants so people tend to park farther than they need to. Summer student marking where you put mousquito stuff in storm sewers could mark the hydrants as follows.. 1) paint an x on the pavement that shows clearly where one can't park. 2) have a box around it painted so drivers can see immediately this is not an available parking spot. .. not sure how datasets applies to this but this seems a nice initiative to add ideas!

Public Transit: accurate, detailed and in near real time

Public mass transit is the lifeblood of any major city. Its full adoption solves so many headache woes for the growing city. In a effort to arm users of open data to visualize, develop for, analyze, measure the quality and growth of our services. It is important that this data is produced and maintained from an accurate and reliable common source. While there issues surrounding exporting that data, I feel that having this data set exposed in near real time will allow for the start of development of a host of improvements to ridership. As well as more informed and accurate discussions about reliability and service quality. Having this data in both solid form, as well as a event broadcasting API (which can be build by us/others) would allow for users of this data to provide real time responses to bus cancellations/rerouts/name changes/ect. The trickle down of this can play into a host of other applications, including: - Realtime routing - Alerts - Service notifications - Urban desirability indexes - People/Traffic flow analyzation - Road use/lifespan indexs or any data analyzation that benefits from accurate bus location and travel. I recommend the following fields: { ReportTimeStamp, TypeOfReport, // info notice, cancellation, maintenance request, etc. BusID, IsRemote, // Flag for reports that are reported on behalf of a bus, / or have no location data GPS: { // Location of the bus when the report was made Lat, Long }, // Important fields for why and perhaps how (as a later follow up field). Powered by a enumerated list of standard choices. why: { ReasonType: Text: // The important idea here is to mark nearly exactly why, rather then a generic "cancellation" or "information". This is important so that we can split the data along lines. For example not all "cancellations" are cancellations. Every time a bus changes its name or route, in some datasets its considered cancelled, because the bus "stopped" and its "gone". But in reality, that bus and its driver is flying around the city - most often as another number. We would do good to know when a bus comes online, when a bus is offline, when its rerouted or reassigned (to where, as what, and why) or when its broken down or otherwise stopped. }. Route: { Number, Title: { EN, FR } StartingDes: { Timestamp, Text: { EN, FR } }, EndingDes: { Timestamp, Text: { EN, FR } } }

Details on bus stop amenities

I'd like to know: has transit map, has shelter, has sheltered bench, has unsheltered bench, public garbage can, recycling bin and bike parking.

Some datasets accumulate several months/years. This makes trendspotting hard. Please separate by year or month or day or have a date field.

Public bathrooms in less urbanized areas

A directory of public bathrooms (not those "must be a paying customer" bathrooms) would make more-rural areas less perilous for those with relevant illnesses. Not exactly needed downtown.

Speed data from speed display boards

I understand that the speed display boards that are used as a traffic calming measure also collect data about how fast drivers are going. It would be interesting to see and map this data, especially if it includes time of day. Could be helpful in showing drivers/pedestrians/cyclists which areas are the worst for speeding.