BSLA Fieldbook BSLA 2014 Fall Fieldbook | Page 50

BSLA / TOOLBOX m offers opportunities to craft individualized routes for each person on each trip. An example of the more traditional strategy in Boston is the Freedom Trail, a walking trail to historic sites marked with red brick pavers midlining the sidewalk (http://www.thefreedomtrail.org/). It is a wonderful go-to for Boston tourists, because it is well known and relatively easy to find and follow. However, it may not provide the optimal experience for all tourists. What about people with mobility challenges? Or people with only an hour to spare? How can we give them the ability to get the most out of their trip? Modern Tools RIGHT WAZE community based traffic and navigation apps Modern wayfinding tools typically have three fundamental elements: • good data • an effective way of presenting that data • social feedback. The availability of good data, particularly about destinations and transportation options, is a necessity for personalized wayfinding tools. Whether you’re a researcher supporting a study, a public employee looking for a specific statistic, a citizen looking for information about his or her city, or a developer of smart phone applications based on that data, you already have a wealth of resources at your fingertips. See https://data.cityofboston. gov/ for a source of data relating to the City of Boston. Similarly, Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA), the region’s transit agency, makes most of its data available at http://realtime.mbta.com/. Despite the fundamental importance of good data, data alone is not sufficient. Data repositories can be intimidating for the inexperienced and data can be easily misused by the uninformed. Not everyone is used to trawling datasets for the most useful information. This is where the competitive market has responded, seeing a demand for information presented in an easily digestible way. For wayfinding, there are now websites, smart phone applications, and even digital displays that allow users to interact with data in a way that is meaningful to them, and easy to navigate. 48 BSLA A third important factor in modern wayfinding tools is the ability to provide and make use of social feedback. Input from prior users allows travelers and visitors to be selective between the various tools, as well as interpret the data in even more “meaningful” ways. Data doesn’t provide opinions – people have to use and interpret that information to form their own opinions. For example, knowing a restaurant’s location doesn’t tell you if you want to go there. Reading reviews on a popular website that rates restaurants based on certain criteria, does. There are many apps that have realized and capitalized on this important factor in sifting through what is often too much information, and too many choices (Yelp® is a popular example). Some apps provide ‘crowd sourced’ (i.e. by many other users of the app) transportation information in real-time (such as Waze®). Such apps can be very useful for navigation as they provide relevant, localized, and timely information for the user. Initiatives in Boston When it comes to wayfinding, people in Boston (and elsewhere) have learned quickly.