GOOD: PDX Alert | Paige, Jesse, Yoshimi

Hi Friends, 

We actually decided on a field to tackle right away: Emergency Awareness in Portland. This had to do with the Public Alert System in PDX that almost completely failed two weeks ago. So… with that in mind, we’ve come up with these ideas. We’ve done some brainstorming to flush them out, but I’ll just list the components here, sans additional info. 

The problem is that Portland is totally unprepared for an emergency. How can we use what systems are already in place to better prepare Portlanders for emergencies? How can we create new systems in cost-efficient ways? 

1. Using TriMet as a Public Alert System, instead of sirens. Trimet is already around the entire city at once, including in the periphery. They have an entire system that can be utilized for dispersing Emergency Information. 

2. “You + Me + Everyone We Love” An emergency preparedness festival along the water front. 

3. Public art that serves as Emergency Alerts. One placed in each Portland neighborhood, created by artists within the neighborhoods. 

4. Web Component & Meet Up Plan: Emergency PDX or “M+Y+E” that provides information about what to do in an Emergency, and that provides a way for people to plan, in advance, where they’ll go if there’s an emergency. 

5. Portland Developers Save the City: A plan for all Portland app developers to put an emergency element into their apps, so if there’s an emergency anyone using their apps will receive important information. 

6. Add’l Idears: We have more ideas that we’re exploring and we can hardly wait to hash them out more and see how they develop.