InfraInput.org

BGSA Brown Bag SeriesSeptember 27, 2011

Parfait Gasana,

MS in Economics

pgasana2@illinois.edu

Public Infrastructure

• Def. - the wide array of assets and facilities that

enable the functioning of a society and economy– All installations that house, transport, transmit, and distribute

people, goods, energy, resources, services, and information

• Public goods managed by government bodies– Externality and spillover traits and non-exclusionary/non-rival in

consumption

Aging System

• Policy of new construction over maintenance

• Industry practice of segmented life cycle

(Design-Bid-Build method)

• Lack of performance measurement, inventory

data, and infrastructure management system

Why InfraInput?

• To start conversation on public works issues

• Local citizens as stakeholder (user and owner)

• Inefficient political process (i.e., lobbying,

earmarks)

• Needed coordination of agencies, policymakers,

builders/contractors, engineers, & citizens)

Website Development

• Literature reading on infrastructure

• Wikipedia articles (public capital, metropolitan

economy, public infrastructure sidebar & portal)

• Microsoft Access database (tables and forms)

• Online interface (html & php coding, mysql database)

– BlueHost webhost/server and domain account, FileZilla FTP

client, PhpAdmin, Apache

Website Features

• Simple website/minimalist design

– Function > Design (i.e., craigslist.com, google.com)

• Fifteen user forms and database output tables

• Includes other pages: About, Contact, Form

Directions, Form Guidelines

Site Concerns

• Complaint site against companies

• Security/Hacking

• Fraudulent entries

• Publicity/Word of mouth

– Champaign/Urbana, IL beta launch

Future Enhancements

• User accounts (sign-in/log-in)

• Pagination of output tables

• Excel, PDF, CSV, Print-out plug-ins

• Query page for searches by area, issue, etc.

• Comments section for interaction

• Ideas ???