The AIFA (American Infrastructure Fixing Agent)

Inspiration

America’s infrastructure is aging and underfunded, and the cost of waiting keeps rising. Bridges, roads, water systems, and the power grid continue to receive poor grades, while local governments and agencies are asked to do more with limited budgets and incomplete information. The data that could help prioritize repairs already exists in public reports and databases, but it is scattered, hard to compare, and rarely turned into clear recommendations that decision-makers can act on.

I built The AIFA because better prioritization can stretch limited infrastructure dollars further. When leaders can quickly see which problems carry the highest risk and community impact, they can focus resources where they matter most instead of reacting to whatever issue is loudest or most recent.

What it does

The AIFA is a tool that helps surface and prioritize infrastructure issues so public officials, engineers, and community groups can make clearer decisions with the information they already have.

It pulls together publicly available data on roads, bridges, weather risk, and related conditions, then highlights which problems appear most urgent based on safety, community impact, and available context. Users can ask straightforward questions such as “Which bridges in this area should we look at first after heavy rain?” or “Where should limited maintenance dollars go to reduce the biggest risks?” and receive a prioritized list with supporting details and suggested next steps.

The goal is not to replace engineers or policymakers. It is to help them spend less time hunting for information and more time acting on the highest-impact issues.

How we built it

I focused on making the tool useful for people who need answers, not on building the most complex system possible. The AIFA connects public infrastructure and weather data sources, organizes the relevant information, and uses AI to compare options and explain why certain issues rise to the top. The result is a simple interface where someone can ask a question in plain language and get a structured, prioritized response they can review and share.

The prototype concentrates on a practical loop: bring the data together, highlight what matters most, and present clear recommendations that support real decisions.

Challenges we ran into

Public infrastructure data is often incomplete, outdated, or formatted differently depending on the source, so making it comparable took more work than expected.
Ranking issues fairly is difficult. Safety risk, number of people affected, and repair urgency do not always point in the same direction, and the tool had to make those trade-offs visible.
The scope of infrastructure is huge. I deliberately narrowed the focus so the prototype could deliver useful answers instead of trying to cover every type of asset at once.
Decision-makers need to trust the output. That meant showing the key factors behind each recommendation rather than just delivering a score or a list.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

Created a working tool that turns scattered public data into prioritized recommendations decision-makers can actually use.
Designed the prioritization so users can see both the ranking and the main reasons behind it.
Built a simple interface that lets non-technical users ask questions and receive clear, structured answers.
Demonstrated the prototype on realistic scenarios such as post-storm risk and maintenance backlog prioritization.
Showed that better organization and prioritization of existing information can improve how limited infrastructure resources are allocated.

What we learned

The biggest barrier is often not a lack of data but the difficulty of turning that data into decisions that busy leaders can act on.
Clear prioritization and transparent reasoning matter as much as the underlying analysis.
Narrowing the scope early made it possible to deliver something useful instead of an incomplete general system.
Public agencies and communities already have more useful information than they can easily act on; the opportunity is in making that information easier to compare and prioritize.
Tools like this create the most value when they support existing decision processes rather than trying to replace them.

What's next for The AIFA (American Infrastructure Fixing Agent)

Expand coverage to additional infrastructure types and more geographic areas based on where the greatest need and available data exist.
Incorporate additional public sources that improve the quality of prioritization.
Allow users to adjust how different factors (safety, population impact, cost) are weighted so the tool can reflect local priorities.
Add simple ways for teams to review, comment on, and share recommendations.
Explore pilot opportunities with local governments or agencies that want better visibility into where limited funds should go first.
Continue refining the tool so it remains practical and easy for non-technical users to adopt.