TireTrace

Home Screen
Route Impact to Andover Town Center
Dracut City Hotspot map
Tire Guide - Passenger car
What to look for - Tire Guide
Boston - Petition Generator
Petition to Boston
Road Runoff Scores in Merrimack Watershed

Inspiration

Tire wear is the #1 source of microplastics in oceans, even bigger than plastic bags, and nobody has built a tool to make that visible. Right next to us is the Merrimack River, one of the most polluted rivers in New England. We wanted to change that narrative, so we built TireTrace.

What it does

TireTrace maps tire particle runoff from roads into local waterways, shows users their personal commute's pollution contribution, and traces every storm drain to the exact river it feeds. It gives both individuals and city engineers a clear picture of where the problem is worst.

How we built it

Built in Flutter using MA DOT traffic data, MassDEP stormwater infrastructure, and USGS watershed maps to model road-level runoff in real time. We have a Python backend processing and cross-referencing the raw government datasets so that they can be used within the actual app.

Challenges we ran into

Cleaning and cross-referencing separate government datasets that were never designed to work together was the hardest technical problem we solved. Each dataset used different systems, naming conventions, and update frequencies that had to be reconciled before we could build anything meaningful on top of them.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

Getting the drain-to-river tracer working with real Massachusetts data was our greatest achievement. Initially we didn't imagine it to work for anyone across the state, but now the user can just tap a drain, and see exactly which river it flows into, and how much impact that drain has on the environment.

What we learned

We learned just how powerful current environmental data, and that the proper combination of programming and this data can revolutionize the pollution scene. Teamwork was also a game-changer, as that's the only reason we were able to think through roadblocks and design the best possible solution.

What's next for TireTrace

First, we want to polish our app and make sure it works well. Our long-term goal is a B2G pilot with a Massachusetts city stormwater department, and even further down the road, we're aiming for expansion to multiple states with EPA Clean Water Act stormwater permits.