Risk Radar

Inspiration

We realized that people don’t always have access to timely, localized information about safety concerns in their communities. Important incidents — like nearby crimes, natural hazards, or public emergencies — are often scattered across different platforms, making it hard for residents to stay informed. We wanted to create something lightweight, transparent, and accessible: a dashboard that makes community safety as simple as checking your zip code.

What it does

RiskRadar provides real-time safety alerts based on zip codes. It aggregates local incident data from open sources and organizes it into clear, easy-to-understand categories. Users can:

Enter their zip code and instantly see nearby safety alerts

View alerts by category (crime, natural hazards, public emergencies)

Understand the severity and type of each alert without digging through raw feeds

See updates as new incidents are ingested in real time

How we built it

The frontend is built with React, Vite, and TypeScript to deliver a fast, responsive user experience. The backend is a Flask API that handles fetching, normalizing, and categorizing safety alerts based on zip codes. The two communicate through RESTful APIs secured with CORS and API keys. We deployed the backend on Render and the frontend on Netlify, using environment variables to keep configurations consistent. Everything is managed in a GitHub monorepo with CI/CD pipelines, issue/PR templates, and documentation to streamline collaboration.

Challenges we ran into

Integrating different data sources and mapping them accurately to zip codes

Debugging CORS issues between deployed frontend and backend

Combining separate frontend and backend repos into a clean monorepo while preserving history

Designing a scoring and categorization system that’s both simple and effective in limited hackathon time

Accomplishments that we're proud of

Built and deployed a fully working full-stack safety alert app in under 36 hours

Designed a user-friendly dashboard that makes complex safety data understandable to anyone

Successfully automated ingestion, categorization, and display of real-time alerts

Set up a professional GitHub structure with CI/CD, documentation, and contribution guidelines that made teamwork smooth

What we learned

We learned how to coordinate effectively across separate codebases and merge them into a cohesive project. We saw firsthand the importance of clear repo structure and documentation under time pressure. On the technical side, we deepened our skills in deployment (Render + Netlify), Git subtree workflows, API integration, and real-time data handling. Most importantly, we learned how rewarding it is to build something that addresses a real community problem.

What's next for RiskRadar

Expanding data sources to include government advisories, weather services, and emergency APIs

Adding predictive analytics to highlight trends in local incidents over time

Introducing push notifications and Slack/Teams integrations so users get real-time alerts

Building mobile-first experiences and multi-location dashboards for families or organizations

Strengthening security with OAuth login and role-based access for personalized features

Built With

• cors
• css
• dotenv
• flask
• github
• github-actions
• html
• javascript
• netlify
• npm
• pip
• python
• react
• render
• restful-api
• sqlite-(or-json-based-storage)
• typescript
• vite