Real Time, Real Value

From PCJ Editor Wayne Senville:

Residents of Richmond, Virginia, have immediate access -- via their personal computers -- to two remarkable sources of information:

• RichmondCrime: a crime information resource that allows anyone to see the location of crime reports and learn the nature of the crime.
• Vacant Richmond, which allows anyone to see the location of vacant properties and find out who owns them.

What's perhaps most amazing is that this resource was developed by concerned citizens, not by city government or a large organization.

Above map is posted on the Oregon Hill web site -- Oregon Hill is one of Richmond's neighborhoods; when you go to their site and click on one of the "flags," the nature of the crime is indicated; you can also choose whatever time frame you want for viewing crime reports. And, you can zoom in or out.

Ross Catrow, who helped put together RichmondCrime and Vacant Richmond, is co-owner of PharrOut, a Richmond-based web design and development company. Why put together this information, I asked? Catrow's reply: "We love Richmond, so projects like RichmondCrime are exciting for us." Catrow's interest grew out of his seeing what he believes was the first web site of this kind: ChicagoCrime.org.

How's it done? One key is that Richmond City has freely available crime incident reporting data. This

information, with some skill and knowledge, can be combined with mapping services such as Google Maps, and then can be zoomed in or out to whatever geographic level (street, neighborhood, whole city) you want to see the data displayed. Interestingly, when I asked Catrow how much time it took to maintain the RichmondCrime site, he replied, "At this point RichmondCrime's entire process is automated. I hardly put any time into maintaining the site!"

It's amazing how much more powerful the visual display of information can be than plowing through reams of print outs. As Catrow succinctly put it, "Making data available in a spreadsheet is nice, but you can't visualize a 250 row spreadsheet like you can a map."

The best way to get a feel for RichmondCrime and Vacant Richmond is to take a look. For example, go to Vacant Richmond, and type in the address: 320 North 27th Street (or some other) and then use the default viewing radius of 0.3 miles (or type in another radius).

You'll see a map centered on that address, along with a list of nearby vacant properties (obviously, this is a part of the city that's very distressed). Then click on one of the vacant properties listed, and you'll get more detailed information -- as shown below.

The detailed information available at your finger tips includes city property reports on the report (such as the property's tax assessment and zoning information) and -- quite usefully -- other properties owned by the same individual or company.

Catrow adds that, "You can also overlay crime data from RichmondCrime. This, hopefully, gives you an idea if an abundance of Vacant Property is correlated to crime."

Catrow also notes that can people can add comments about properties (see one example) on the Vacant Richmond site and upload photos (see one example). But he adds, "Crime is a little different, because there is a victim. I'm not sure how people commenting on crime would play out."

What's the reaction to this new resource? According to Catrow, "Most feed back from residents is either very positive: 'Thank you so much for doing this.' Or 'I was mugged yesterday and it didn't show up on your map.' The area neighborhood associations seem to love it, and recently I helped integrate it into Richmond's growing community blog network. As for local officials I've never heard from them."

If you're a planner or citizen activist, I'd urge you to take a few minutes to browse through RichmondCrime and Vacant Richmond and see how something like this whether something like this might make sense in your own city or town.