Design and deploy : co-creative public transport planning using a web -based stakeholder engagement tool

Abstract

Using new technologies, such as web-based applications and online map visualizations, to help public engagement for public transit campaigns is an emerging trend in the urban planning field. Scenario simulations and map-based visualizations to show accessibility or travel time impacts can provide users insights into the possible results of new transportation projects. CoAXs (Collaborative Accessibility-based Stakeholder Engagement platform) is a web-based application that has been implemented in experimental public engagement exercises in three cities in the United States to test its potential for facilitating the public engagement process around public transit advocacy. In 2016 and 2017, two types of experiments were conducted using CoAXs in Boston, New Orleans and Atlanta. One used a workshop-based approach, in which participants were gathered in a room and used CoAXs with facilitators' help. The other experiment took an online, remote approach, in which people used CoAXs by themselves, with the help of an online tutorial. By using a web log and survey data, this research found that the self-learning process works in the remote version and the more a user uses it, the more s/he thinks CoAXs is easy to use. However, the remote version performed worse than the workshop approach in terms of usability and possibility for inspiring imagination.