In the near future, people will be able to avoid public hazards like floods, open manholes, or simple cracks on the road that may potentially harm or danger the public. This would be thanks to "HazMap," a mobile application will inform people where these hazards are.
According to Techcrunch, "HazMap " was one of the many applications that came out from "Disrupt London 2016 Hackaton" and was created by risk management insurance provider Craig Polly and software engineer Oras Al-Kubaisi. The mobile application will use global information system (GSI) mapping through Esri.
"HazMap" will use crowd-sourced information of public hazards and other maintenance projects happening in public spaces without the need to contact local authorities through email or phone call. The application will work similar to Nainatic's popular Pokemon-themed game "Pokemon Go" and will also offer badges, according to Techcrunch's report.
HazMap wants to be like Pokémon Go for reporting hazards in public spaces https://t.co/H1OFVYqoF2 #TCDisrupt
— TechCrunch (@TechCrunch) December 5, 2016
To report public hazards through the "HazMap" mobile application, users will need to snap pictures of public hazards they find, and this will be reported to appropriate agencies and local authorities. In the "HazMap" website, users will be able to view these reported public hazards through a live map similar to "Pokemon Go," helping users keep track of public hazards in their area.
"HazMap" will also have a dashboard that ranks municipalities depending on how fast they can solve user-submitted reports of public hazards. For now, "HazMap" works only in UK, but plans of making the mobile application available globally are on the table. Also, "HazMap" is only available for Android devices for now, but will soon have an iOS version.
"HazMap" will contact local authorities once a user-submitted public hazard was posted, and this will push the proper authorities to work on the reported public hazard. And with the public hazard available for "HazMap" users to see the live map, developers hope that it will urge local authorities and agencies to address the problem faster.
