NOTES: RUNNING THE APP
To run the app, first clone the repo. You will need two terminal windows open. first, while in the root directory, run yarn install, then run cd api and run yarn install again. then run yarn start while still in the api directory. In the other terminal window, navigate to the root directory of the project and run yarn start. This will open the site in a new tab in your browser. Because the data we used did not have 100% coverage of the US, we recommend testing the site with the zip code 60015
OUR HACK
Motivation:
Available to us today on the internet is an inconceivable amount of information. Data is constantly accumulated by our government, NGOs, and researchers alike, but where does it all end up? Thousands and thousands of data sets have been compiled and hosted online and in these numbers hides incredibly valuable information. The thing is, researchers know this. Academics know this. But do the people know this? Is this information readily available to the community? Well, kinda. Our goal is to democratize the data.
Vision:
By sifting through the information found on government websites like the CDC, EPA, and NIH, we gathered datasets related to environmental risk factors, such as air quality, rates of illness, and causes of death and we tied all this to zip codes. This provides you, the user, with a unique opportunity to learn about environmental risk factors, health concerns, and rates of illness by location and even compare these to the national averages computed by the same data set. On the site you can explore digestible information about the towns you live in, where you might be moving, or just places you’re curious about. This project is about bringing the power of knowledge back to the people. With easily accessible data visualizations of potential community concerns, current and potential community members can be informed about risks factors their family has, or might be, exposed to.
Future Directions:
The platform we have built as of now is just a starting point. Not only can our platform can be scaled to include many more datasets, but it has countless potential future directions. Our vision includes features where users who say, are moving to a new town and are specifically concerned about air quality because a family member has bad asthma, are able to examine preferential zip codes that best fit to their personal needs. This is just one example. Whether you utilize this to make informed decisions about moving or to spark change in legislation to mitigate environmental health risks, it’s everyone’s right to have access to digestible information. We believe that knowledge is empowerment and everyone has the right to know about the places they live. With the millions of data points collected and available online it’s our responsibility as community members with technical backgrounds to to give back. We want to put the data back in the hands of the people it’s meant to protect. It is our job to make this happen.
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