Sidewalk users are not all equally able to adapt to poor conditions or impediments. This issue has a greater impact during winter when road snow removal is prioritized over sidewalk snow removal.

Primary stakeholders

The primary users of SideWaze are those who use sidewalks and whose mobility and freedom are negatively affected by impediments. This user group includes parents with strollers and small children; wheelchair users; and those with mobility concerns, including the elderly or those with mobility aids (e.g., walkers, canes).

Goals and Motivation

The goal of this work is to explore the possibility of crowdsourcing the gathering of high frequency, location-specific sidewalk condition data.

Contributors of data (the ‘crowd’) will be able to submit information related to condition (damage, construction, impediments, snow coverage, etc.) and severity. To be useful, that information needs to be accurately tied to a geographic location, be timestamped, and validated in some way.

Consumers of sidewalk data will be able to learn about the sidewalk condition for a given neighbourhood or route. This information can then inform user decisions around travel (e.g., can I walk to the market with my child in a stroller or will I get stuck in the snow?) and, indirectly, promote active travel.

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