Leading Curb Management Company, Coord, Launches Digital Curb Challenge Across North America

Up to three cities across North America will be selected to partner with Coord to undertake a free, curb space management pilot program in 2020 to create more efficient, safe and accessible streets

NEW YORK–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Coord, the industry-leading curb management company, today announced the launch of the Digital Curb Challenge. Starting today, cities of all sizes and other curb managers such as airports, entertainment venues and universities across North America can apply to partner with Coord to undertake a curb space management pilot program, free of charge and tailored to their unique mobility challenges. Applications can be submitted at https://www.coord.com/digital-curb-challenge-2020 and are open until February 14, 2020.

With Coord’s comprehensive curb management platform, cities are empowered with the necessary tools to digitally inventory, price, allocate and manage the curb. For example, cities can reduce double parking and congestion by providing fleet drivers with the tools and incentives to park legally through a Smart Loading Zone Program. Created by city planners, Smart Loading Zones enable commercial drivers to locate nearby loading zones, see whether they’re available, and book space in them, all through a City-authorized app. Coord’s platform puts the city at the forefront of curb management programs like this with tools that enable everything from site selection, driver communication, rule enforcement, and program performance.

“We know that to solve some of our most critical transportation challenges, cities must be in the driver’s seat with scalable solutions in hand,” said Stephen Smyth, Co-Founder and CEO of Coord. “With our platform, cities are empowered with just that — a Digital Curb, built with the necessary ground-level insights to improve their streets more seamlessly and effortlessly than ever before. We can’t wait to bring these tools to more cities and expand access to the curb as we kick-off our first-ever Digital Curb Challenge.”

Cities or organizations selected for the Digital Curb Challenge will have free and complete access to Coord’s full suite of curb management solutions for the duration of the partnership and the opportunity to work closely with Coord experts to develop an effective, scalable pilot program to be deployed in 2020.

“As cities are grappling with increasing demand for curb space, the best way to figure out how to respond is to pilot different solutions,” said Beth Osborne, Director for Transportation for America, which is focusing on the curb in its third year of the Smart Cities Collaborative. “Every opportunity to innovate provides valuable information to the city and better use of public assets to the taxpayer. Coord is providing three cities with exactly the help they need.”

“We were delighted when we learned that Transportation for America’s Smart Cities Collaborative would be focusing on curb space pilots this year,” said Dawn Miller, Head of Policy and Partnerships at Coord. “They had tremendous interest from cities, and we created the Digital Curb Challenge to both facilitate more cities launching curb space management pilots in 2020 and to expand this opportunity to other organizations that experience curb space management challenges, such as universities, health systems, transportation hubs and entertainment venues.”

Just as every city is unique in how it approaches curb management, each Digital Curb Challenge pilot program will be tailored to the host’s challenges, resources and interests. Pilot programs may include, for example:

• Smart commercial loading zones: reduce congestion and safety hazards caused by double-parking vehicles by creating tech-enabled commercial loading zones, bookable by app for participating fleet drivers
• Ride-hail management: reduce congestion and safety hazards caused by ride-hailing congestion by creating passenger loading zones the City can easily manage and evaluate
• Demand-responsive pricing: reduce circling for parking while maintaining parking availability by regularly re-pricing metered parking to target one or two available spaces on every block

Since 2016, Coord has been building tools that enable cities to better manage their curbs as new transportation modes continue to change the way people get around. Cities can view and analyze their curb supply and demand data in Coord, allowing them to easily quantify the impact of alternative scenarios and communicate tradeoffs to stakeholders. This data can be supplemented with the Coord Collector mobile app, which leverages augmented reality to collect detailed, precise curb inventory and occupancy data quickly and easily. Mobility companies use the Coord API to ingest comprehensive curb regulation data and incorporate it into their day-to-day operations to improve efficiency, safety and compliance along the curb.

With the help of leading engineering firms and municipalities, Coord now supports 15 cities across North America, including: San Francisco, Los Angeles, New York, Seattle, Austin, Miami, Philadelphia, San Diego, Washington D.C., Boston, Chicago, Atlanta, Denver and Vancouver.

“Dynamic curb management has quickly become the most important topic in our industry today, with practitioners trying to adapt policy and practice to support ever-changing needs and using all means of data to support those decisions,” said Brett Wood, Parking and Transportation Consultant at Kimley-Horn. “In that arena, I’ve been very impressed with Coord’s approach to curb management, creating data streams and analytical tools that help practitioners better understand how the curb works today and how future changes could impact the overall mobility ecosystem.”

“I’m excited at the opportunity to leverage resources that streamline processes and allow more time to be spent developing solutions that achieve community goals,” said Jane Wilberding, AICP, Senior Transportation and Parking Planner at Sam Schwartz. “Curbside data applications like Coord’s provide policy makers with meaningful insights into the complexities of today’s designations that enable them to make more informed decisions when balancing the amount of space and time allocated to the growing number of users competing for curb space in the future.”

“Curb management is an increasingly critical part of making cities work. The historic lack of tools and data have made it impossible to think intelligently about the curb, much less to allocate and manage it well,” said Rachel Weinberger, Principal Weinberger & Associates and Senior Transportation Fellow at RPA. “The contributions of Coord to enhancing our ability to know what’s happening and figure out what needs to happen are absolutely game changing. I’m excited about the Digital Curb Challenge and psyched to see the creative responses that will pour in.”

“The Neighborhood Empowerment Project and Streetopia UWS at Open Plans are working to inspire local stakeholders to take ownership of and re-imagine their curb space to meet 21st Century demands. The first step is understanding what exists and how it’s used. Coord has been an invaluable partner, providing info on existing rules and regulations and the amount of free parking space in NYC,” said Janet Liff, Director of the Neighborhood Empowerment Project, Open Plans. “We look forward to their new project, getting dynamic information and discovering how the existing rules dovetail with demand. From there, we’ll have a solid springboard for change.”

For more information on the Digital Curb Challenge, please visit https://www.coord.com/digital-curb-challenge-2020 or contact Coord at challenge@coord.com.

About Coord

Coord helps cities manage their streets, starting with the curb. The company was founded in 2016 with the belief that streets should serve people – not vehicles. Coord is the only comprehensive curb management platform, empowering cities with the necessary tools to digitally inventory, allocate, price and manage the curb. The platform supports over 17,000 curb miles across 15 cities, with the goal of serving over 100 cities across the globe by 2021. Coord is based in New York City, and backed by Alphabet’s Sidewalk Labs, Alliance Ventures, Trucks, Urban.us and DB Digital Ventures. Learn more at Coord.com

Contacts

Molly Hendriksen

Coord@berlinrosen.com
646.200.5503