These days, tons of vehicles compete for space on curbs. From buses, cars, bikes, dockless e-scooters, and (don’t forget) adorable sidewalk delivery robots, today’s curb isn’t your grandparents’ parallel-parking playground.
But as all of these vehicles have gone digital (even pedestrians are fueled by the directions on their phones), the tech of the curb has been non-existent. The curb consists of old-school concrete and, maybe if it’s lucky, a splash of yellow paint that might keep it a little less dinged up over time. Alas, there is so much more we need to know about our little friend the curb.
That’s why we have to admit we’re impressed by the release of Surveyor, from Sidewalk Lab-spinoff Coord (which also presented on equity in scooter distribution throughout Washington DC’s neighborhoods at last night’s Transportation Techies).
Amit Glazer, product chief at Coord, describes Surveyor in this Medium article:
When we set out to build a parking solution for Google Maps, we assumed that [curb] data would be readily available. We didn’t necessarily think there would be a well-designed API but we at least thought the data would exist. We were wrong. When we tried to figure out how to solve the challenge, we found consultants who specialize in this type of collection. They take to the streets with a wheel, pencil, and clipboard. Given the level of detail and the number of features that we wanted them to collect, the cost was astronomical.
So, we decided to build an app and accompanying management system that gives surveying superpowers to anyone. By using Surveyor, not only can we easily find the exact positions of parking signs and other assets in a fraction of the cost and time that traditional methods require, but we can also use this output to automatically produce a detailed and accurate map of the underlying curb rules.
Instead of taking the time to write everything down on paper in notebooks, as surveyors have always done, this tech solution should cut the data-collection time down considerably. Now surveyors still need to be out in the field, but they simply walk down the block of whichever curb they’re analyzing and the app records all the information they once had to scribble themselves. (Look out surveyors, those afore-mentioned sidewalk robots may soon be looking for work outside of just the delivery sector.)
Photo from Coord.
Surveyor is also billed as being far more accurate than GPS data, which Glazer notes can be “routinely off by 10 feet or more.” The app uses augmented reality, creating a nifty composite view by superimposing a computer-generated image on a user’s view of the real world. (Think Pokemon Go.)
It’s pretty clear that anyone planning curb space should check this out. It’s free for one month at least through the end of 2018.
When Zipcar’s Sabrina Sussman predicted several months ago that “2018 is the year of the curb,” she was definitely on to something. Planners need to get smarter about curb space that benefits everyone and takes into account the many new ways people are choosing to get around. It seems like Surveyor has come around just in time to help them accomplish that.
Photo by Sam Kittner for Mobility Lab.
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