Finding a Space of Your Own…Together

“The people that I liked and had not met went to the big cafes because they were lost in them and no one noticed them and they could be alone in them and be together.” ― Ernest Hemingway, A Moveable Feast

Would you decide to visit a different park if you knew your favorite picnic spots were taken? Or take a different bus route to get a seat on your way to work? As a business owner, would you change the layout of your store to provide a better experience for your customers?

COVID-19 has raised the stakes for managing shared spaces, but the importance – and value – of proactive capacity management predates the coronavirus and is certain to outlive it.

Even before fluctuating lockdowns and restrictions on public gatherings, it was difficult to predict just how busy shared spaces might be. From public transit, to parks, to entertainment venues and public buildings, facility operators must manage a delicate balance of safety, compliance, comfort, and visitor experience. Public and semi-public spaces face the complex task of monitoring real-time occupancy and using visitor behavior to inform facility design, management, and operations. In the case of public transportation, service changes and fluctuating rider schedules pose unique risks and operational challenges.

Successfully reopening the public realm calls for technology, design, and policy solutions as well as strong communications and engagement to enable informed, responsible choices.

Fortunately, existing technology offers the raw capabilities to inform smarter facility management and user behaviors; integrating these with lower-cost, lower-tech capabilities will create more comprehensive solutions to manage capacity. Many spaces already have the necessary foundation to build these solutions.

• Automated monitoring and analytics such as sensors and cameras can help identify crowding and other potential health risks
• Facility design and operations can provide tactical physical and operational design strategies that are low-cost and low-tech to control access to and crowding within public spaces
• Actionable information-sharing can inform decision making, encourage healthy behaviors, and improve user experience through real-time communication prior to and upon arrival at a space

These tools can help cities manage capacity to improve the health and experience of visitors no matter the size or type of space.

Building on these tools, we are tackling capacity management challenges in shared complex spaces, outdoor spaces, and on transit through scalable solutions and creative collaboration.

City Tech and our partners are approaching capacity management through four interrelated strategies to integrate existing assets and advanced technologies to improve short-term operations while building a foundation for continued innovation:

First, we must have the tools to create, manage, and analyze capacity data. Creating a real-time and predicted picture of space capacity and, more importantly, density, allows for improved, dynamic operations as well as health-focused customer engagement. Using data to understand how people move through space sets the baseline for additional solutions.

Equipped with this data, organizations can create communications, data-sharing, and privacy guidelines to help visitors better plan their trips and make decisions before they arrive. Although this data will be most immediately useful in addressing social distancing, these same tools can help us answer the questions we had before the pandemic: will I get a seat on the train this morning? Is there enough space on the bus for my baby stroller? Is the beach too crowded, and is there another less-crowded option nearby?

Thus far, we have relied on businesses and space managers to minimize capacity and density; flexible trip planning apps and communications empower individuals to participate in this process before they even leave their homes. As we noted in an earlier roundtable on managing transit congestion, however, this shift must be a large-scale behavior change.

Once people have arrived, space managers need a way to provide cues to better manage the capacity and flow of visitors in any given space; this becomes especially important in complex indoor spaces. After analyzing patterns, managers might decide to change the physical space of an area, such as limiting entry options or changing the direction of foot traffic; perhaps a grocery store changes an aisle layout to avoid bottle necks. This data can also inform non-design behavioral cues; is one museum exhibit gathering too many people? Timing the opening of another room may help move people along. Taking feedback from these changes can help predict behavior and more proactively manage visitor flow and safety without sacrificing the quality of the experience.

For transit operators, predictive data and proactive demand modeling will help transit agencies make service decisions quickly – such as adding or holding vehicles on a route, or only dropping off passengers once they have reached capacity – thus providing a better and safer experience for riders.

Data collection, new trip planning options, and physical and operational design changes will all have a direct impact the public. Public-facing technology must serve all residents and be as accessible and as user-friendly as possible. City Tech deploys a broad resident engagement strategy to gather feedback on the design, development, and deployment of new technologies, which will be especially critical as we transition from COVID-specific capacity responses to long-term innovation.

Although coronavirus is to blame for many of our concerns about capacity in indoor spaces, outdoor spaces, and on transit, it has also encouraged innovation to long-term concerns. Building on cities’ current assets and implementing new solutions will not only manage space capacity and density to address health concerns, but they will also solve lingering problems and provide a better experience for visitors overall. Some might take a big shift – such as planning and adjusting your trip based on crowdedness – while others behavioral cues you might not even notice.

Read more about City Tech's capacity management work here.

About the Author: Laura Vecchetti is the Communications and Grants Associate at City Tech Collaborative. As a member of the Partnerships and Communications Team, Laura works to connect City Tech with the community. Prior to joining the team, Laura was the Development and Communications Coordinator at Nexus Onarga Academy, a national nonprofit providing specialized mental health services for children, youth, and families, where she helped secure funding for therapeutic programs. In all her roles, Laura enjoys elevating nonprofits’ missions through connection and storytelling. Laura holds a bachelor’s degree in Public Relations from Bradley University.

About City Tech Collaborative (City Tech): City Tech is an urban solutions accelerator that tackles problems too big for any single sector or organization to solve alone. City Tech’s work uses IoT sensing networks, advanced analytics, and urban design to create scalable, market ready solutions. Current initiatives address advanced mobility, healthy cities, connected infrastructure, and emerging growth opportunities. City Tech was born and raised in Chicago, and every city is a potential partner. Visit www.CityTech.org and follow us on Twitter and LinkedIn.