Ward Wise

[smacmullan]

Things we've made

• www.wardwisechicago.org, our aldermanic menu spending data viz tool
• Network Graph of City Government Email Data (might split to a separate group)
• Upcoming bike lanes map
• Ward infrastructure spending heatmap
• Street resurfacing map

Quick ways to get involved

• Join the ward-wise channel on the Chi Hack Night Slack and see what we're currently talking about
• Look at our Github issues list for data analysis and data visualization. If an issue peaks your interest, message us about and we'll give you the latest status.

Non-coding ways to get involved

• Help us collect ward contact info
• Help with UI and usability testing. Check out the data viz app and give us feedback!
• Do you have connections? Reach out to organizations that could benefit from our data. See if they have any data analysis needs
• Validate image data for Project Sidewalk (not related to us, but they do cool work!)

Group information

About the group

Every year, Chicago alderpersons get $1.5 million in menu money to spend at their discretion on capital improvements in their ward. Our group is making menu money spending data more accessible to the public and creating tools to help with participatory budgeting processes.

If you would like more background and an overview of our work so far, check out our Chi Hack Night presentation! It's available as a video recording and as PDF slides.

Active efforts

• Extracting and geocoding menu money spending data from PDFs
• Visualization tool/website for menu money spending

Pending future efforts

• Geocoding street resurfacing data so wards can see where their oldest streets are
• A tool for participatory budgeting project idea collection and evaluation. The current process used by most wards is to have a giant Google Sheet.
• A tool for businesses to track the transportation mode used by their customers (car, walking, bicycle, transit, rideshare). Most businesses assume their customers drive to the and are against any street changes that remove parking. There is no data around mode use.

Group leaders

• Sean MacMullan
• Noah Appelbaum (front end, database)
• Tex Pasley (
• Jonathan Ortega (data viz)

Who we're looking for

People with a passion for urbanism, data analysis, and community engagement.

Tools

• Python (for data analysis)
• Next.js/React
• Postgres SQL & PostGIS
• QGIS

Repos

• Data Analysis Repo
• Aldermanic Spending Data Viz Repo

Other relevant links

• Data and Docs
• Brainstorming Doc

Where we meet

Tuesdays after the Chi Hack Night presentation (roughly 8:20pm CT). Here's the meeting link.

Chi Hack Night slack channel

Check out the ward-wise channel on the Chi Hack Night Slack.