Register, Ride, Win. May 10-16, 2014 Reno Tracks (renotracks. nevadabike.org) is one of the newest startup successes in the northern Nevada tech community. Starting from a vision of tracking bicyclists by using smart phone GPS technology, Reno Tracks has made consistent, productive steps in bringing to market an application that is over-achieving with limited funding. The short project timeline of Reno Tracks is already having a significant impact on transportation planning in the Truckee Meadows by using crowdsourced bicyclist data. Reno Tracks was developed as a competitive entrant for the Hack 4 Reno app development contest sponsored by the Reno Collective in downtown Reno. The Collective supports incubation of creative, synergistic ideas that have an opportunity to improve our access to public data. Hack 4 Reno is the exciting 24-hour competition to build, test and present a web-based app which addresses transportation improvements in the community. The Reno Tracks team was formed on the spot, including Dylan Kuhn, web developer; Brad Hellyar, app developer; Riley Snyder, journalist; and Scott Hall, bicycle advocate. Together they combined the open source code of an existing GPS tracking app from San Francisco and Atlanta with a cloud server and social media marketing campaign that had style and utility. First the team needed to fork the code from Cycle Tracks Atlanta, and then
scrape the RTC Bicycle Map GIS Data showing existing and proposed bicycle facilities. These components were used to build the interactive map depicting the bicycle GPS tracks saved from the iPhone user interface. Next the bugs in iOS 7.0 were cleaned and the marketing component was published using social media venues including Facebook, Twitter and the Reno Tracks website. After a presentation at the Hack 4 Reno, Reno Tracks was awarded second place in the Live, Work, Play Challenge sponsored by the Biggest Little City category. The Reno Tracks team had achieved success, and began searching for the resources to bring the app into the iTunes Store. The Reno Tracks team approached the Nevada Bicycle Coalition (NVBC) to work together in providing funding, direction and support. NVBC agreed and started off by becoming an app developer for Apple. Even though it sounds strange for a bicycle coalition to become a software developer, it was necessary to go through the iTunes process as a non-profit sponsor. Then the Reno Tracks app was given beta-testing status, and a few copies were installed on team members’ iPhones. On Jan. 21, Reno Tracks was officially available on iTunes and ready for download. Reno Tracks utilizes GPS tracking to collect data on bicyclists’ preferred routes while riding to work, school, shopping or recreation.
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Reno Tracks: Startup Success by Scott J. Hall, MPH The data is hosted on Digital Ocean cloud servers and provides aggregate data on route selection, which can then be analyzed by several demographic categories such as gender, age, ethnicity and annual income. The benefits of Reno Tracks are to: • Estimate the popularity of certain bicycling routes and bicycling infrastructure improvements; • Identify targeted areas for road maintenance and street sweeping; • Identify bicycle facilities such as bike racks, parking and bicycle-friendly businesses; and • Allow transportation planners and engineers to identify successful projects before and after construction. Since the launch on Jan. 30, more than 606 routes have been saved and downloaded to the Reno Tracks server which can be viewed on the Interactive map. The Coalition goal is to acquire more than 1,000 tracks from 200 Reno Tracks users by the end of Bike Month in May
2014. This sample size will provide clear evidence about bicyclists’ preferred routes in the Northern Nevada region. The expansion of the Reno Tracks startup can continue into the rest of Nevada including Las Vegas. Improving the stability of the app and providing userfriendliness ensures repeat use and promotion by word of mouth. The open source code is even available to other programmers who want to continue the project in their community across the country. After 24 Hours of teamwork and a $500 investment, Reno Tracks has become a tech startup project that is fueling a transportation revolution in our streets worth millions of dollars. ■