An idea - App for reducing the traffic of sao paulo (and other cities)

[Achim Neugablonz]

Hello everybody,

I found this group by the help of Jonaya from onibus hacker and I hope this is the right place for this post.
Jonaya is a friend of mine and we talked recently about an idea that I had and that it would be a good idea to share it with you people.

I dont know if it is possible and some (more or less important) details are missing, but if I dont share it, I will forget it.
And maybe you folks have an idea to complete it and can use or realize it.


Its about an App (for smartphones) that helps regulate the traffic.
I imagine a point system where you get points for "good behaviour" and with enough points one can later get advantages on the cartaxes or gasoline for free or a carwash, or whatever.

The Players can get points for:

-Sharing a car for going to somewhere (like to work). Therefore the people in the car need to link their apps and need to travel over a certain distance to achieve points.

-Walking short distances and not take the car to a close supermarket. Therefore the moving action of the player needs to be analyzed. I think the google maps api (for example) offers functions for that.
--> Problem: How to safely distinct between slow traffic and walking?

- Using the bus or the underground. Whereas the underground can maybe be discovered by temporary loosing the signal of the gps or the service. But I dont know how to recognise the bus traveling.

-Maybe a game, that involves other player that are also stucked in the traffic. Just to amuse the people. And the daily (or hourly) highest ranked get some points...

-"Over all minimal distance that is travelled in the car" - points. The less the better.
--> Problem: If somebody uses this app on a mobile, that he never takes in the car, he will get many points.


This is what I have until know, but for sure there are other "good behaviors" to be rewarded.
One of the main problems to solve will be protection against manipulation, because if there is something to win, the people get very creative.
Other problem is, how to only support people that realy reduce their usage of a car and not people that dont even have a car?
But maybe there are solutions, that I didnt found jet, and, is it really bad if people without car are supportet?
And how to exchange the awards and the points? An anonymous number for the player, that will be showed in the gas station or the goverment?
And how to convince the people that this data are not stored, or used for tracking them?


I thought that gasstations could be interessted in supporting this, because this would act as advertisment and the people would prefer gasstations that partitipate in this action. And I think you need to offer something to the people to they are motivated to join the action.

I hope you understood my idea and the principle is clear. (sorry for english errors and maybe confusing sentences)

I am sharing this idea with you, because everybody that I told this idea to, said, that this is a good idea and I need to continue with it.
But the deeper I got into, the more problems I found and now I am almost about to forget it.
But maybe someone of you has solutions for the problems or can use this for an own idea.
And one very important point: I dont know how to programm and realize this App.
So if there is anybody out there that want to: use this idea, make it hole and solve problems, please lets share ideas and change the world!!! :D
Or just forget about it .


Many greetings and boa noite,

Felix

[Pedro Markun]

Hey Felix,

welcome aboard :)

Do you know Waze? It does have a lot of interesting features you describe, altough it's not aimed on making anything better from what I got (at least on a city-level... they seems focused on the personal experience).

But it might be worthy to get in touch with them :)

[]'s

Pedro Markun

--
--
Você recebeu esta mensagem porque está cadastrado no grupo "Transparência Hacker"
Para enviar uma mensagem a todo o grupo, escreva para thac...@googlegroups.com
Para não receber mais mensagens, envie um email para thackday+u...@googlegroups.com
Para mais informações, ou para ler mensagens arquivadas deste grupo, visite http://groups.google.com/group/thackday?hl=pt-BR
 
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Transparência Hacker" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to thackday+u...@googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
 
 

[Sérgio Storch]

Felix and Pedro

I once (2008) conceived a project with this purpose for a large company which impact onto the traffic of a region would be otherwise harmful (I guess it came to be so).

Your e-mails incited my will to revive and share that proposal, now with an Open Knowledge drive. Maybe it can be helpful. I keep believing it´s possible and necessary, and that the quest of corporations to have their names associated with sustainability can be mobilized for that.

Here it is: PROJETO CARONA - Proposta conceitual para empresa em mudança para a região Berrini em 2008 - http://bit.ly/19Yv1sY

Sérgio Storch

11-3666.9005 - 11-99753.9701

sergio...@gmail.com

Facebook Sergio Storch

Blog: www.sergiostorch.com

2013/6/10 Pedro Markun <pe...@esfera.mobi>

[Capi Etheriel]

both initiatives sound a lot like the work Meleva startup has been developing during the last year.

I worked with them for a while and hope it manages to make a dent in the current transport reality.

Helder, the founder, is a member of our Transparencia Hacker network, I'm calling his attention to this thread.

[Achim Neugablonz]

Oi Pedro!

Thank you for the welcome :)

I know waze. Do you think they would be interessted to implement this system?
As far as I know do they have a point system for helping the comunity by sending posts about the current traffic situation and petrol prices etc...

Maybe you are right and should contact them. But lets see what other ideas the people here has, like Sérgio Storch.

And am I right, that []´s means abracos? (I am new in Brazil)

Greetings,
Felix

[Achim Neugablonz]

Oi Sérgio.

I read your presentation but my portuguese is not the best until know.
What I understood is, the idea is to build an App (or a network) that makes carsharing more easy and even lucrative for the people (by earning points to get a taxi paid in emergency cases??)

Sounds also very good. In fact the carsharing aspekt is the point of my idea that seems to be the best realizable point.
What happend with this project? Is terminated or was never implemented?

All the best,
Felix

[Achim Neugablonz]

Oi Capi.

The idea behind Meleva sounds very good. Is it only made for airports? Or is there a possibility for metro stations or stadions or bars and discos?
Good places for a taxi, too.

But I dont know how to merge the two ideas. Maybe the point system can be included in the taxi sharing app...
Would be interesting to know what Helder thinks about this...

Best wishes,
Felix

[Achim Neugablonz]

I think I found a way to see if a person is using a bus or not.
In this post
https://groups.google.com/d/msg/thackday/fiQZgSoTQbA/Igt-Mh5UD-4J
an application is described that knows where the busses are. This means, with this data and the position of a player, it should be possible to detect if a person is using a bus...

[Helder Ribeiro]

Hi Achim, Meleva is currently restricted to use in airports. We've tried nightlife and other things but getting adoption and critical mass is really hard so we're sticking to airports for the foreseeable future.

There's a ride-sharing system along the lines of what you said (with credits and stuff, although doesn't add public transit info) called Caronetas.

With any such initiative, my recommendation would be to be as ridiculously narrowly-focused in the beginning as possible. Pick *one* route and make it work there, then adjacent routes and so on. Critical mass is a hell of a tough nut to crack, especially for something real-time with so many variables.

There's still a lot of room for initiatives like this though, so keep at it :) Let me know if there's anything that I could share from my experience that would be useful to you.

Cheers,

Helder

--

Fundador, Meleva.com

Em São Paulo: 

+55 11 9 8955 8070

+55 11 3230-7675

Em Santiago:

+56 9 7553 7132

No aeroporto:

http://meleva.com

Em qualquer lugar:

Skype: obvio171

Se você usa a Wikipédia, assine para doar R$5/mês e ajudar a mantê-la no ar:

http://bit.ly/wikipedia-assinatura-mensal

[Sérgio Storch]

Hi Pedro, Capi, Helder and Felix

This issue so gigantic and important that I think it deserves a concentrated effort to make it take off in large scale.

My provocation to Helder: since you´ve already taken the initiative in developing the app, how about your pulling those who are willing to collaborate so that your initiative goes forward and comes to be a citywide success?

I can help in netweaving with the public sector and other interested people.

An immediate suggestion in terms of strategy is, how about customizing the interface for use in schools? I guess the number of schools where leadership appears to make it happen has the potential to create a network effect with a positive spiral dynamics. And we can design more dynamics to promote contagion, such as prizes etc...

Sérgio Storch

11-3666.9005 - 11-99753.9701

sergio...@gmail.com

Facebook Sergio Storch

Blog: www.sergiostorch.com

2013/6/11 Helder Ribeiro <hel...@meleva.com>

[Achim Neugablonz]

@Helder
Thanks for the help offer, if anything will start to grow here, there will be for sure lots of questions.
I can imagine that it is difficult to grow a user base that is large enough to make the app interesting for the people.
I am wondering if there is a security problem with this app. If I got it right, you need to enter your flight and a point to meet. Than you share a taxi. But you need to have the same destination, or at least close. If somebody wants to steel you, he can say he has the same destiny and when the taxi is gone he robber you. Or is there something I missed?

Anyway, the other service, caronetas, sounds very much like the program that sérgio described in his presentation. (If I got it right, because my portuguese is still not the best ;)
@ Sérgio, am I right, that Caronetas is what you described?

And Sérgio, what did you mean by customazing it for schools? That people let other people take their children to home? I think I would just do this with friends or people from my neighborhood.
And than the initial idea of awarding people for sharing a car comes back into count. Or did I misunderstood you?

But I agree that omebody should coordinate this hole project. I am unexperienced in this kind of topic, I just have ideas and can reach many people.


I was wondering if it will be a good idea to reward people for taking the bus and using the app by lower the price of the bus tickets. Especially in these days the people will be happy to spend less for puplic transportes, since the recently price increase.
So now why should the goverment lower the prices for the puplic transportation system, after it has it just increased? They will not have to lower the prices, but maybe a huge company that want to become a better image (like sérgio told in an earlier post) will support this action.
And maybe the goverment it self will support this to reduce the revolt and uprising...
just thinking.
Unfortunatly will the development and implementation of such an project take more time than the average revolts last, I think.

However, what do you think?

Greetings,
Felix

[Capi Etheriel]

there's a "how to steal a Meleva user?" tutorial at the app's FAQ.
but my two cents: it will never work for paranoid people, we should not worry about them.

[Achim Neugablonz]

This is true. Lets hope that there are not many paranoid people out there :)

[Capi Etheriel]

as long as it is clear that there's more value than harm in living networked, initiatives will thrive.
and, as you probably saw from the FAQ, it's not worth it to give all your personal info to personally mug any Meleva client.