Technology

Video I was disappointed to see the recent failure of Tacoma’s Streets Initiative #2, which would have provided dedicated funding for street repairs and safety improvements. This motivated me to explore alternative ways to help keep our city’s streets in better shape. As someone who regularly bikes around Tacoma, I’ve experienced firsthand how many of our roads are deteriorating. Some are reaching a point where full replacement – and significant cost to the public – will be necessary.

Pictured above: Bus Arrival prototype with data fed by R and OneBusAway API Tacoma has not historically been not known for being a city rich in technical talent. We have Infoblox, TrueBlue, Accumula and a handful of other growing tech companies, but until recently it has been hard to find anyone who knows their way around a spreadsheet, much less a database. Learning technical skills in the South Sound is born out of necessity of getting the job done as quickly as possible and as cheaply as possible.