“Government 2.0” has been a big buzzword of 2009, with thought-leaders like Tim O’Reilly and The Sunlight Foundation showing the way. It’s a movement that pushes public institutions to use technologies that have thrived in the last five years (like social networking and blogging) to foster closer relationships with citizens. This entails being more open with data and encouraging people to build apps around that data and transform it through mashups for use by others.
A few city governments have made good on their pledges to be more transparent. San Francisco unveiled DataSF, a central clearinghouse for data collected by the city, and showcases some apps here. New York City went a step further, launching a full-on apps contest through Betaworks-backed startup ChallengePost.
It’s been almost three months since the contest launched, and several interesting applications have turned up. You can check them out here. (To be clear, some of the data for these apps is collected through government institutions and some of it is bootstrapped.). But here are a few of the highlights:
Primospot: Hands down, the biggest pain of owning a car in a major metropolitan city is finding a place to park. Primospot is building a database of all parking regulations in Boston and New York, so you can figure out where you’re legally allowed to park now or in the near future. Primospot generates maps like the one above, showing what’s in the red zone and what’s not. Primospot can also send you text messages for when your parking space is about to expire, and you can search for parking that’ll be available in the near future.
And, in case you don’t think it gets any better, you can also compare parking garage prices in real-time. The company just launched an iPhone app called iPark, so you can record where you’ve parked in case you forget.
All in all, it seems like a very helpful app and one that’s sorely needed in a city like San Francisco that has poor public transportation. The user interface could be a smidgen better. I’d rather see markers showing how much of the curb is available for parking rather than noting a single point along several blocks. It’s a helpful start, though, and the team has been very aggressive in adding features every month.
Bookzee: This app helps you find available library books nearby. You can search for books either on the web site or through the iPhone app and it will show you which nearby libraries have a particular book available. Again, it’s only available in New York. San Francisco’s library system has its own online search, although it could benefit from a facelift and some mobile availability.
Taxihack: Rude taxi drivers better watch out. This app lets people leave Twitter-style mini-reviews of drivers using their medallion number. The interface is barebones for now, but it’s a big step up from the old way of reporting poor taxi drivers (call 311 and testify before the Taxi & Limousine Commission). Now if only there was a way to take photos of medallions and pull up reviews, Google Goggles-style. I guess that’s for another day …
Buy This Item: [Click here to buy this item]