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The CAT That Roars

Chatham Area Transit (CAT) is collaborating with Georgia Tech and other partners to deliver on-demand last-mile/first-mile transit in Savannah

In the commercial logistics and distribution industry, the COVID-19 pandemic pushed companies to upgrade last-mile capabilities – the ability to get products from the grocery store or distribution center to people’s homes. What has often been left out of last-mile planning is getting people themselves connected. Fixed bus or train routes often leave people blocks or even miles away from transit, miles that have to be traveled on foot to get to doctor’s appointments, the grocery store, work, schools, and more.

At a press conference in Savannah project partners stand in front of a Chatham Area Transit Authority micro-transit van. From left, Debra Lam, executive director, Partnership for Inclusive Innovation; Andrew Young, field representative, Office of Sen. Raphael Warnock; Roxanne Ledesma, supervisory grants manager, USDOT; Ben Levine, special advisor, USDOT; Savannah Mayor Van Johnson; CAT CEO Faye DiMassimo; CAT Board Chair Diedrick Cody; Robert Hampshire, deputy assistant for research and technology and chief science officer, USDOT; Nicholas Savas, regional outreach coordinator, Office of Sen. Jon Ossoff; and Georgia House Rep. and former Savannah Mayor Edna Jackson.

Now, thanks to the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law’s (BIL) Strengthening Mobility and Revolutionizing Transportation (SMART) grant program, Savannah will launch a pilot project to develop first mile/last mile on-demand transit. The app will seamlessly connect people to Chatham Area Transit Authority (CAT) fixed bus routes to get people where they need to go more efficiently and economically.

The $1.2 million grant was announced by the U.S. Department of Transportation in March. A total of 59 projects in 33 states were funded to the tune of $94 million to develop projects that improve transportation efficiency and safety using advanced smart community technologies and systems.

“The future of transit looks different,” said CAT CEO Faye DiMassimo. “Savannah is a great market for this project. It’s not so big that we can’t right the ship, but it’s not so small as to be not applicable or scaleable in other markets. And it’s a market with lots of different employment areas, tourism, a historic district, and warehousing/distribution.”

The Partnership for Inclusive Innovation (Partnership), which is supported by Georgia Tech’s Enterprise Innovation Institute, is putting together an advisory board comprised of local leaders and national transit experts, who will help ensure the work follows best practices from around the country while also addressing the specific needs of Savannah’s transit riders.

“Having corporate, civic, and nonprofit leaders involved to see how this project will impact their employees, students, and clients, will help ensure its success,” said Debra Lam, executive director of the Partnership. “National subject matter experts will be brought on for their expertise and also to share the project outside Savannah.”

The app, which will connect riders on demand from A to B and even to C or D, will operate similarly to Uber or Lyft. Riders will input their location and destination. The app will seamlessly connect users from curbside pickup by micro-transit to fixed bus or boat routes and will include paratransit if needed. It will synchronize bus and on-demand feeds to have buses and riders at the right place at the right time. Riders will be able to see when their curbside pickup will arrive and will pay a single fare for the entire trip.

Pascal Van Hentenryck, Georgia Tech’s associate chair for innovation and entrepreneurship and the A. Russell Chandler III chair and professor in the H. Milton Stewart School of Industrial and Systems Engineering, and his team developed the software, which was also used on MARTA Reach, a pilot project to add on-demand micro-transit to connect to bus and train routes in Atlanta.

“We have been working on this new type of transit system for more than 10 years,” said Van Hentenryck. “These are transit systems that are combining fixed routes and on-demand shuttles to provide door-to-door affordable services. We have developed all the technology for planning and operating such on-demand multimodal systems: What should be the fixed bus route? What should be the frequency between them? How many shuttles do you need? How do you dispatch them such that you serve people as quickly as possible?”

During Phase I, funds will be used to design the system, develop partnerships, and create ways to bring the community together so that riders will have a voice in how on-demand transit is built out. The pilot will connect three areas across the county. One pilot community includes the Tiny House Project, a neighborhood of permanent, affordable tiny houses that is home to 22 formerly unhoused veterans. The neighborhood, which will soon grow by 50 more houses, will continue to focus on veterans, and will also be open to other homeless people.

The Phase I project will run for 15 months. Following that, award winners can apply for a Phase II grant to implement improvements to Phase I and expand projects. For Savannah, the Phase II goal is to have on-demand micro-transit available across the region, seamlessly delivering visitors, students, and residents to jobs, historic sites, school, and wherever they need to go.

“We’re excited to implement this research,” Lam said. “It’s been done in other cities and every time it’s gotten better. Phase I will develop a blueprint that is electric, multimodal, and addresses last mile/first mile. It’s data driven to increase efficiency. It will empower communities through public transit. It will enable people to get to the doctor, to work, to school, wherever they need to go.”

More about the project can be found in this video, “Chatham Area Transit Announces SMART Grant to Improve Transportation Efficiency,” put together by the city of Savannah.

Georgia College Students Present Project Outcomes in 4th Smart Community Corps Closing Session

Students from 11 Georgia universities worked together to tackle civic innovation projects across Georgia over the summer period

 

Students from the 4th cohort of the Smart Community Corps along with the Partnership team

The fourth cohort of Smart Community Corps (SCC), one of the Partnership for Inclusive Innovation’s flagship programs under the Student Engagement pillar, wrapped up in August with presentations at Microsoft’s Atlantic Yards from student interns about their summer projects. The SCC is designed to provide civic-minded graduate and undergraduate college students from around the state hands-on experience working with communities in Georgia on projects to improve the lives of residents. And these students delivered, with projects that range from improving the flow of traffic to getting food from farm to table in underserved communities.

 

“There is no better way to learn about civic tech and public innovation than actively working with community partners on projects that make a difference,” said Partnership Director Debra Lam. “Our ambition was grand and these students showed us that it could be done and done well together.”

 

Launched in 2020, the Partnership for Inclusive Innovation is a public-private organization that was created to lead coordinated, statewide efforts to position Georgia as the leader for innovation, opportunity, and shared economic success. In addition to student engagement, the Partnership’s focus pillars also include community research, workforce development, and economic opportunity. The Partnership’s mission is supported by a number of private and public institutions, including Georgia Power, Synovus, the University of Georgia, Flowers Foods, and Georgia Tech.

 

This year’s program launched in May with 33 interns competitively selected from 140 applicants. They represent 11 Georgia universities and 17 academic disciplines. The students spent the summer working on 16 projects across the state. In addition to the civic innovation work, what makes Smart Community Corps unique is its pair model. SCC interns work primarily in pairs on projects, bringing complementary backgrounds, skills and expertise together to learn from each other as they collaborate on the projects.

 

Student projects have a real impact around the state. For instance, in studying traffic patterns in Valdosta, students found that drivers were speeding most often during the times when cars and students were going to and from the middle school, making for not just frustrating drop offs and pickups, but also dangerous ones. In Spalding County, student work will mean greater access to wireless broadband in underserved parts of the county.

 

“We hear a lot of positive feedback from legislators and from economic developers around the state,” said G.P. “Bud” Peterson, the Partnership’s board chair, and President Emeritus and Regents Professor at Georgia Tech’s Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering.

 

This summer was the first time since 2019 that the interns worked in person rather than virtually. An $8,000 stipend funded by contributions from Microsoft and Gulfstream helped cover interns’ expenses for the 12-week program.

 

Olasumbo Ogunsola, a student at Georgia State University, worked on a project with the Savannah Logistics Innovation Center

Olasumbo Ogunsola, a student at Georgia State University, worked on a project with the Savannah Logistics Innovation Center (SLIC) to help connect tech businesses with government, academic, and private partners.

 

“It has been an amazing opportunity,” Ogunsola said. “I’ve really learned a lot from my executive director with SLIC, have learned a lot about logistics management and about new companies that are starting up in Georgia and are trying to expand. It has really changed my life. My project partner, Mark Schwabacher, a Georgia Tech student, was offered a position by the executive director of SLIC. I was also able to get something with a healthcare company. This has really opened a lot of opportunities.”

 

While most of the students worked in one community, Nikhil Upadhaya, a student who’s been at

Nikhil Upadhaya, a student who’s been at Georgia State and will transfer to University of Georgia this fall, was part of a statewide project to map innovation and entrepreneurship

Georgia State and will transfer to University of Georgia this fall, was part of a statewide project to map innovation and entrepreneurship. “I think what drew me to the project was that I had never heard of anybody researching entrepreneurship within Georgia. And personally, I learned a lot about data analytics, and how to analyze the data and look through it all to push research further into whatever somebody might need the data for.”

 

Paige Clayton, an assistant professor in Georgia Tech’s School of City and Regional Planning, oversaw the project. She was so impressed with Upadhaya that she hired him for the fall to continue his work. “The work he did was definitely beneficial to my work and that will hopefully benefit Georgia,” she said.

 

And that’s the goal of the program — for students to put the knowledge and skills they’ve learned in the classroom to work in Georgia to help create more sustainable, innovative, and technologically advanced communities.

 

“A lot of Georgia students tend to leave the state after graduation,” said Clarence Anthony Jr., the Partnership’s workforce development manager. “The SCC engages some of our next wave of leaders within higher education to work with senior leaders throughout the state, building a nice bridge and partnership, but also showing students they have opportunities to stay here, to do meaningful work if they want to.”

Partnership for Inclusive Innovation Announces 2022 Smart Communities

Four Georgia communities receive support for projects that leverage applied research, technology and data to advance innovation in smart resilience

 

WARNER ROBINS, Ga. — The Partnership for Inclusive Innovation, a public-private organization designed to position Georgia as the leader for innovation, opportunity and shared economic success, today announced the winners of the 2022 Georgia Smart Communities Challenge, at Central Georgia Technical College in Warner Robins.

 

Representatives from the 2022 Georgia Smart Communities Challenge cohort (Photo: Matt Hummel)

The award-winning Georgia Smart Communities Challenge supports teams of applied researchers, municipalities and nonprofit groups to work together over the course of the year on locally driven priorities ranging from installing sea level sensors for hurricane resilience to building digital twins for public safety and transportation.

 

The 2022 theme, Smart Resilience, sought projects that address topics including disaster response, energy efficiency and public safety.

 

“This year, we add four communities from across Georgia, spanning three economic development districts and including multi-disciplinary researchers from Georgia Tech, the University of Georgia, Kennesaw State University, Morehouse School of Medicine, Middle Georgia State University, Clayton State University and Augusta University,” said Stephanie Broxton, the Partnership’s community research manager.

 

“The selected communities submitted strong multi-disciplinary, multi-university research project proposals that aim to advance innovation by leveraging technology and data. Communities from throughout Georgia were selected to ensure impact across the state.”

 

Each of the projects will receive financial and technical assistance to support and continue the work of implementing applied research from university partners, as well as assistance from the Partnership for monthly meetings, community engagement and promotion of project outcomes.

 

Georgia Tech is a proud member of the Partnership for Inclusive Innovation,” Ángel Cabrera, president of Georgia Tech, said. “We’re truly committed to creating opportunities for all Georgians to drive innovation and to make Georgia the Tech Capital of the East Coast.

 

Cabrera congratulated the Georgia Smart winners and added, “This work is sure to create lasting transformative change, not just for the winning communities, but also for their neighbors and everyone who benefits from this research in the future.”

 

The 2022 cohort communities and projects are:

 

City of Atlanta: The project will use innovative diagnostic techniques to perform energy audits in Atlanta’s Thomasville Heights community, with the goal of achieving significant cost savings compared to traditional building energy auditing practices. The audits are done with minimally invasive drones equipped with remote sensing instruments to analyze building exteriors. The method holds promise for overcoming homeowner hesitancy about weatherization programs and can be replicated in distressed neighborhoods throughout the city. The project is especially timely in the Thomasville Heights community, where ongoing challenges such as acute unemployment and poverty will soon be compounded by the closure of long-neglected subsidized housing. Researchers from Georgia Tech and Morehouse School of Medicine, and representatives from Focused Community Strategies will work with the city of Atlanta on this project.

 

“We are currently supporting neighborhood stabilization in Thomasville Heights,” said Dr. Latrice Rollins, assistant professor for community health and preventive medicine at Morehouse School of Medicine. This project will allow “us to use utility rebates and bulk purchasing as solutions for poverty amelioration and will reduce the cost of energy.”

 

Atlanta Project Team:

 

Athens-Clarke County: The Climate Resilience Project through Technology and Transportation Innovation will evaluate and improve community preparedness in response to the growing severity of environmental disaster and the region’s increasing population. The project will include the development and deployment of a survey to gauge existing disaster preparedness and resident interest in improving preparedness in their communities. Leaders will engage with the community to create an all-hazards mitigation plan, neighborhood disaster playbook template and strengthened neighborhood-level resource and relationship network. The goal is to minimize risk and work toward providing equitable outcomes for all members of the community in the event of a catastrophic disaster. Researchers from the University of Georgia, Augusta University and Kennesaw State University will work with Athens-Clarke County on this project.

 

“Athens-Clarke County is dedicated to building a culture of readiness and resiliency for all of our residents,” said Mayor Kelly Girtz. “Through this partnership, I believe we will make Athens-Clarke County a safer, strong and adaptable place to live.”

 

Athens-Clarke County project team:

 

The Henry County Smart Resilience Decision Support Tool (DST) will be an interactive web-based tool to assist county planners, policymakers and county officials as they assess and explore the impact and potential of new greenspace, warehousing and freight-related infrastructure projects. The tool will help county officials answer the question: How can Henry County reconcile community economic development objectives with quality of life and energy resilience concerns? Researchers from Georgia Tech and Clayton State University will work with Henry County on this project.

 

“We are so excited and honored that Henry County has been chosen to receive the Georgia Smart Award,” said Carlotta Harrell, chair of the Henry County Board of Commissioners. “We continue to look for ways to improve and enhance transportation for Henry County residents and this continued partnership with Georgia Smart allows us to do just that.”

 

Henry County project team:

 

City of Warner Robins: The project will develop and test a Citizen Safety Digital Twin for Community Resilience through the integration of a dynamic license plate reader solution with police department investigation practices. The project team will build on previous work to refine an interface that enables the police department to see where crimes are predicted to occur and suggest placement of license plate readers to detect them. The team will engage with the community and key stakeholders to collect and analyze feedback about the system. This project will help Warner Robins to maximize both deterrence and detection, with the aim of lowering crime rates across the city. Researchers from Georgia Tech and Middle Georgia State University will work with the city of Warner Robins on this project.

 

“Police departments are under-resourced and understaffed around the nation,” Warner Robins Mayor LaRhonda Patrick said. “The use of technology has been a force multiplier to reduce crime. This grant will give Chief [John] Wagner and the entire police department team the tools they need to provide public safety for our city. This is proactive crime prevention.”

 

Warner Robins project team:

 

The Georgia Smart Communities Challenge has a strong track record of success. Alumni have implemented their projects and garnered additional funding and technical assistance to continue projects beyond the two-year program period, allowing them to continue serving their residents and meeting community goals.

 

“As an initial Georgia Smart partner and long-time supporter of the Partnership, Georgia Power is proud to support innovation across the state through this announcement of a new cohort of Georgia Smart communities,” Chris Womack, chair, president and CEO of Georgia Power, said at the event. “This cohort of Georgia Smart community projects is unique because it is inclusive, it supports multi-disciplinary and multi-university projects, and it fosters collaboration, with all communities working toward smart resilience initiatives.”

 

About the Georgia Smart Communities Challenge (GA Smart) program:

When municipalities experience 21st century challenges that require strategic planning, Georgia Smart is an award-winning program that assists leaders in identifying solutions that are researched, tested and evaluated by subject-matter experts. Often referred to as simply “Georgia Smart” this community research assistance program empowers communities on their journey to innovation by helping them to envision a smart and connected future. This program has served 20 communities across the state of Georgia, helping to activate over 140 technologies and facilitate over 30 community engagement meetings. Alumni of the program have gone on to experience wide-ranging success, including recognition on a national and international scale.

 

About the Partnership for Inclusive Innovation:

Launched in 2020, the Partnership for Inclusive Innovation is a public-private organization that was created to lead coordinated, statewide efforts to position Georgia as the leader for innovation, opportunity, and shared economic success. The Partnership’s focus pillars of community research, workforce development, student engagement, and economic opportunity are a powerful combination that provide technical and financial support to democratize innovation through collaboration. Since 2020, the Partnership’s work has catalyzed 30+ projects with local governments, universities, startups and nonprofits. The projects have created new businesses, increased access to financial and social capital, and deployed more than 170 technologies. More information is available at pingeorgia.org.

Partnership for Inclusive Innovation Hits One-Year Milestone

Public-private initiative drives economic opportunity across Georgia

 

A year ago, a coalition composed of the State of Georgia, the Georgia Institute of Technology, and the civic and corporate sector, launched an ambitious plan to advance innovation, opportunity, and shared economic success across the state, positioning it as the tech capital of the East Coast.

 

The City of Savannah in collaboration with the Partnership for Inclusive Innovation, is exploring applications of emerging data analytics and machine learning techniques to leverage existing city data to guide decisions on the best strategy to deal with vacant and blighted properties in the community.

September was a one-year milestone for the Partnership for Inclusive Innovation, a public-private organization charged with implementing that plan through the three pillars of community research, student engagement, and economic opportunity.

 

“Our charge was to support existing hubs of innovation, nurture promising leaders and entrepreneurs, especially from communities not often included in this discussion, and invest in the most promising and scalable technology-driven, community-based solutions,” said Debra Lam, the Partnership’s executive director. “What’s really exciting is seeing how our efforts in this first year are yielding tangible results that position Georgia to achieve inclusion one innovation at a time.”

 

The Partnership is supported with funding from the State of Georgia, a blue chip roster of some of the country’s largest corporations, strategic partners, and Georgia Tech, which also is providing administrative oversight. The Partnership already has 15 project sites across nine economic development regions and deployed more than 140 technologies. Public engagement and knowledge transfer remain core components of the Partnership’s offerings, with nearly 700 attendees in events and active digital communications, including monthly newsletters.

 

The areas of focus and the Partnership’s impact over the past year are reflected in three flagship programs.

 

Innovate for All: To scale economic opportunity, Innovate for All funds and supports proven programs, services, and technologies created by Georgia’s innovators. In the past year, it funded the Georgia Mesh Network and the Working Farm Fund.

 

  • The Georgia Mesh Network: Augusta’s theClubhou.se is piloting the statewide network with Atlanta, Columbus, Macon, and Savannah to offer skills training and certification to historically disadvantaged and underserved entrepreneurs. It is backed with the commitment of 21 capital partners to support entrepreneurs who graduate from the program.

 

  • The Working Farms Fund: Through the Conservation Fund, this effort is committed to the preservation of local farms that are increasingly falling victim to the pressures of rising costs, low margins, and corporate consolidation, which stresses the food supply chain. The fund, which is at the forefront of advocating for a healthier and more resilient food supply chain, secured $1 million in additional funding, acquired two farms: a certified organic produce farm in Mansfield, and a 21.2-acre farm composed of 15 immigrant and refugee smallholder farms in Conyers.

 

Smart Community Corps: This summer program, supported by Microsoft, pairs students — from any Georgia college or university, any year and major — together to work on Partnership projects. Though experiential learning and public service, students can effectively advance technology and practice innovation by living and working with the communities. The 2021 cohort of students from Georgia Tech, Morehouse College, Savannah College of Art and Design, and Valdosta State, logged 5,280 hours on their projects, which ranged from addressing blight in Savannah to traffic monitoring in Valdosta, to smart pedestrian planning in Clayton County.

 

Georgia Smart Community Challenge (GA Smart): Now in its fourth year, with 16 community projects, the program allows localities across the state to apply for research assistance that empowers them to envision, explore, and plan for a smart future. The 2021 cohort includes the cities of Woodbury and Concord, and Pike and Spalding counties. This cohort will work with Georgia Tech researchers to expand and enhance connectivity and explore additional applications that will improve their services, efficiencies, and cost savings.

 

The Partnership is expected to support $2.88 million of programming this coming year across the state. It maintains its lean operations model through key partners at Jabian Consulting, Brand Culture, Jackson Spalding, and Kilpatrick Townsend. “While the Partnership has advanced much in its first year, we look forward to ongoing progress and growth utilizing innovation and technology to service Georgia today and tomorrow,” Lam said.