supporting online elicitation for deliberation of public transportation concerns

8/15/2019 Supporting Online Elicitation for Deliberation of Public Transportation Concerns

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Supporting Online Elicitation for Deliberation of Public Transportation Concerns

Michael Patrick, B.A.

University of Washington Department of Geography

Abstract: Qualitative methods inform the design of a participatory system in two ways; the generation of system requirements and enabling large groups of public participants to use quali-

tative methods themselves as ‘participant researchers’ to self discover their own value systems.

This then allows the incorporation of these multiple personal perspectives and realities into de-liberative discussion of major transportation infrastructure investments. Discourse analysis,

content analysis, and textual analysis along with multiple forms of participant observation were

used to identify key aspects foronline interview techniques and evaluate their application for de- ployment via the Internet.

Deliberative processes deploy across varying spectrum from macro-scale societal paradigms

down through group discussion process and eventually grounding in the individual’s own state-

ments of belief. Discourse and content analysis is used to derive a discourse typology to identifythe roles and transformations of information in the system, to expose the mechanisms of author-

ity, social interactions and knowledge building. This typology is used along with textual analysis

of online venues to select the most appropriate communication genre. A framework for address-ing the multiple geographic scales of not only traditional coordinate systems of location and

time, but other axes of values and representations is suggested to coherently position and relate

concepts occurring in the initial interview and following deliberative processes.

A purposeful elicitation method based on that framework that accommodates the cognitive

and epistemological processes of the individual is proposed that can facilitate self discovery and provide rich source material for group processes, while neutralizing and mitigating undesirable

influences. Two examples of a transportation concerns elicitation interview using this structureare compared; one highly structured using Internet Instant Messaging and another using semi-

structured conventional face to face. The IM interview was condensed into narrative form and

concept maps generated using NLP/STP (Natural Language Processing / Shallow Text Parsing. By using geo-demographics; an typical transportation concern was extrapolated to the regional

population and spatially located using GIS.



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Origins

The origin of my research question is based on the need for increased public involvement in

decisions about major investments in transportation infrastructure. Transportation planning his-

torically has been based on a fundamentally technical perspective – improvements have been ini-

tiated based on massively aggregated statistical data on traffic flows and projections based on

census statistics incremented at decade intervals which feed mathematical models1.

Research Question

The research question is motivated by the number one research objective of the PgisT (Par-

ticipatory Geographic Information Systems for Transportation) NSF research grant project2,

which is “What Internet GIS design will satisfy information requirements for public participation

in analytic-deliberation process contextualized by a capital improvement decision situation?”

This is basically a Participatory Action Research scenario. Design and provision of such a soft-

ware system to enable the collective intelligence of the public to address major transportation

infrastructure investments through a deliberative process requires ‘qualitative’ approach in two

ways.

The first part of my research question is then to identify the system influences, aspects and

metaphors to generate design requirements using critical discourse analysis and content analysis

before defining patterns and architecture, and grounding these in relevant theoretical frame-

works. The second part of my question is how to capture the individual viewpoints and values of

a large group of hundreds or even thousands of people and then enable the individuals them-

selves to collaborate as “participants as researchers’. This also involves scoping tools and utili-

ties to permit visualization such as participatory concept mapping.

State of Knowledge

These two parts of the research question indicate our current state of knowledge to even con-

ceive of an effective Internet participatory system is in doubt, the first because of the governmen-

tal and institutional momentum of planning transportation systems, and the second because of the

social construction around software technology development. The first issue is mitigated some-



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what by a recent shift in planning and engineering thought, which is moving away from massive

monolithic transportation projects towards multiple lifestyle behavior, targeted custom provision

to specialized consumer markets – an evolution which began occurring in the free enterprise

market place when Ford started offering different models and colors than the standard black

Model T. The second issue can be mitigated by examining existing social science theories and

building down to the code instead of standard business software workflow analysis and models.

Confirmation of the first issue can be found in the decreasing feasibility of large scale expan-

sion of existing infrastructure and the increasing recognition that behavioral mechanisms are the

only effective means to decrease demand. This has created an emergent need to examine the

preferences and value systems of individual transportation consumers. Rather than macro level

region wide models, transportation models are now shifting towards micro level ‘Activity Based’

studies which more accurately portray the mode shifts and trip behavior of individuals in much

smaller geographical areas3. Also, there is an increasing need to address all transportation op-

tions as a unified system, rather than as separate systems of mass transit and highways, for in-

stance. The process of gathering individual preferences is inherently a more ‘qualitative’ exercise

than the ‘quantitative’ approach. Scaling such a qualitative approach to accommodate hundreds

or even thousands of participants across a large metropolitan region and normalizing the data so

that it is useful for use in planning and engineering is most cost effective by leveraging the Inter-

net to communicate with the public.

Confirmation of the second issue can be found in the irony of noting that while the personal

computer and network communications first became ubiquitous in the early eighties, there is still

a severe deficit in effective networked collaborative environments. This is almost certainly due

to the fact the users are forced to conform to the technology, and that the various forms of online

publishing and communication are more based on technological mechanistic needs of computers

and the convenience of software designers than any real basis in how ordinary people communi-

cate and construct knowledge. The software application metaphors such a ‘desktop’, ‘e-mail’,

‘documents’, and ‘folders’ are superficial glosses on what are fundamentally rigid hierarchical

computing structures 4.

This is readily verified by the common experience of attempting an e-mail discussion with

more than one person. In short order, the profusion of “RE:RE:RE’ in subject lines and mutually

invisible ‘CC:’ s and topic drift render confusion and disconnect rather than clarity and collabo-



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ration. The explosion of various forms of Internet venues such as newsgroups, listserves, blogs,

and forums seem to generate even more divergence and complexity rather than convergence and

simplification, these seem to enable the power of the author while diminishing the ability of the

reader to make sense of it all.

Application of qualitative methods can provide insight into these two issues 5. In the first

case, critical discourse and textual analysis can identify the significant social spheres of dis-

course, power relationships, and information channels. These influences in turn can be used to

identify and prioritize the discourse and argument structures in play, and then these can inform

the appropriate metaphors needed to identify the important aspects of a system through content

analysis. In the second case, participant observation can inform the appropriateness of these

metaphors and aspects, and comparison of similar structured interviews can validate the effec-

tiveness of online in comparison to face to face (F2F) techniques.

Influences and Ethical Issues

Qualitative methods, especially from a feminist perspective can also identify key ethical is-

sues embedded in a large scale technology based collaborative system. Since the system is con-

ceived as a public system, for use by ordinary people, as academics and technicians we are

primed to propagate existing positivist philosophies and potentially ignore the issues of ordinary

users. Academics and software developers whenever possible build on the knowledge structures

and schemas of others before us, respecting and citing the current conventional wisdom of our

field, and our tendency towards specialization may cause us to ignore the potential contributions

of other academic fields. Also, it is unlikely that the systematic knowledge of the average person

maps onto the existing highly technical institutional representations of the transportation net-

work. Further, even the notion that there is some statistically ‘average’ or ‘typical’ transportation

consumer ignores the specialized needs of individual persons and subpopulations 6. When mem-

bers of the public are asked to make decisions about transportation, these will be based on their

own beliefs rather than institutional scientific data, and it is their individual multiple perspectivesand value systems will influence any decisions.

A feminist perspective can expose our pride and extensive technological knowledge that

blinds us to the obvious realities of our current software systems, and lead us to build yet another

house of cards on top of another that is already falling7. It has been observed that if commercial

airliners were engineered to the same reliability as personal computers connected to the Internet,



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80% of those airliners would be filled with passengers sick from Ebola just before aircraft itself

exploded. Our software systems and communications are provided be corporations with their

own economic and power agendas which rarely align with the needs of typical users. Software is

all about power, and it is so brittle, complex and delicate that it can rarely accommodate chang-

ing realities and emerging conditions.

Also, any Internet based participatory system will be fundamentally affected by ‘Digital Di-

vide’ issues. Since the access is via the Internet, this predisposes a certain population with tech-

nology provision and familiarity with online genres of communication, which can seriously un-

der-represent certain populations because of economic class, age, and minority status. Even if the

individual has Internet access, their level of comfort about privacy engaging in any process that

explores their personal lifestyle around transportation will impact recruitment and process. Edu-

cational status will have a serious influence; the process also requires a certain level of literacy,

the expectation that the participants will generally compose complete sentences and perhaps

short paragraphs. Most of all, a person’s attitude and patience will be stressed by the seemingly

repetitive nature of the questions. The other influence is that the geo-demographics reflects their

residence, and says little of their space time trajectory, place of work or other aspects of their ex-

perience.

Resources

The primary resources needed for my project are already present in an academic environment

– ready access to a widely varied selection of journals across different academic disciples, access

to the campus network for connectivity and applications. While these preliminary structured in-

terviews could be accomplished with existing IM clients, the software to analyze and generate

the natural language processing from the transcripts was beyond my skill level and required the

assistance of an external programming team. Another key resource was volunteers to participate

in the interviews and provide feedback on the techniques. The most important resource was ac-

cess to the variety of my fellow researchers on the team, who provided critical feedback, discus-sion, guidance and reading suggestions and the support of my principal investigator for the grant.

Introduction and background

Designing any software system is, in the beginning, a qualitative exercise. The main diffi-

culty was shear breadth of the subject – transportation touches every person and institution at all



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levels of society, and affects environmental, economic and equity issues. In a corporate environ-

ment, one first looks to the market of the enterprise, external to the business itself, because the

system also needs to account for interactions with vendors and customers and regulatory agen-

cies. Only then does one turn to examine the internal business model. In the commercial sector,

these forces are essentially economic and objective in nature, and directly reflect to the products

and services of the company, describing a ‘value network’. The architect relies on qualitative

methods to discover these via examining corporate documents, conducting interviews, writing

use case narratives and building user stories. These yield the overall patterns and aspects. The

goal is to establish a compelling metaphor – an analogy common to both the architect and cus-

tomer that resonates with the activities being performed. The use of metaphors is compelling be-

cause it allows the users to communicate their activities readily in ordinary language, and the

metaphor can provide the beginnings of structure for the system. The software development ef-

fort had no compelling metaphor to guide progress.

While this conceptual path works well in a business environment, it rapidly hit the rocks

when applied to a public system because the users were everybody and the subjects were diverse,

and the roles obscure. Critical discourse analysis and textual analysis of the public discourse

about transportation was attempted to identify the spheres of discourse, reasoning, and the chan-

nels of communication between them. This analysis examined multiple sources: institutional,

agency, and NGO documents, news media articles, editorials and letters from readers. Severalexamples culled from this analysis provide insight into dividing the public sphere and relating

those parts to public participation. A discourse typology was then derived from these insights,

and the system described according to the discourse spheres and information channels between

them.

The Public and the Politics in the Puget Sound

Recent major transportation projects in the NW have a dismal record of success. Recently

citizens of Seattle voted to short circuit the conventional government process and undertake amulti-billion dollar capital transportation project, the Monorail, outside the existing governmen-

tal institutions supposedly responsible for transportation improvements8. This came up for sev-

eral public votes before finally being scrapped because of cost over runs and a steadily increas-

ing perception of unrealistic cost benefit ratios and distrust of agency management. In another

case, when the state legislature with rare bipartisan cooperation passed a significant capitaliza-



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tion funded by a gas tax for transportation projects based on the recommendations of technical

experts and planners, a swift and overwhelming grass root counter narrative appeared, culminat-

ing in an anti-gas tax citizen initiative.

When we examine what was said in the media, the issues and themes were more emotional

than logical, and a reaction not against the projects themselves, but rather a backlash against the

institutions themselves. This citizen initiative with 14,000 volunteers collected more than

420,000 signatures in 32 days to place the measure on the ballot. Initiative organizer Ron Carl-

son stated in the Seattle Times9:

“Opponents of the initiative admit they're stunned (and to be completely candid, so are initiative support-ers). But what does it all mean? … People aren't ignorant about transportation. In fact, they understand it

probably better than any other issue. Why? Because they travel every day. So does everyone they know.

They see what their taxes are buying. They talk about it with family, friends, neighbors and co-workers on aregular basis. People aren't trying to have it "both ways." The oft-repeated claim that the public is demand-

ing improvements it doesn't want to pay for is simply not true … People are angry because they're not get-ting what they paid for. What people want is one thing: congestion relief.”

These examples demonstrate that the complete failure of politicians and various special inter-

est groups to address the public’s perceptions and values. We can look underneath at how this

hegemonic condition occurs by examining the membership, minutes, and recommendations of

the January 2000 Blue Ribbon Commission on Transportation 10. The membership included most

of the typical political elite and vested interests, with only two members from so-called ‘public

interest’ groups (labor unions with their own vested interests), and notably ‘Public Opinion’ was

last on their agenda of 16 items and was barely touched on. Although this group did an extensive

review of everything from freight mobility to studded snow tires, the only public input was from

a very narrowly focused telephone multiple choice stacked deck survey of 800 voters. Still, it

was noted in the minutes by the Chair that:

“… it is hard to know what will cause people to believe their government is efficient and how best

to shed light on efficiency issues. The perceived detachment from government does not help, and he

questioned how we can instill a sense of personal engagement – the equivalent of a community roof-

raising – for transportation improvements.”

It was then recommended that the state add a ‘theme’ to their public relations messaging. How to

relate to the public was discussed in very condescending terms:

“… The presentations led some to wonder if there was a disconnect between the public perceptionand the reality. It was noted that the speakers had only presented one side…. Some expressed the

opinion that these objective criteria might prevent small, passionate groups from unduly influencing

the process in their favor … Since the public has a limited appetite for specific details, it would re-

quire significant effort to tailor a message that frames the issue in appropriate terms. … It would behelpful, however, if these costs could be put into terms that people could readily understand.”



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It is interesting to note that this gas repeal initiative by a close margin nearly imposed the

public’s ‘reality’ by slashing available funding by 60%, and what most people complained about

not having enough transparency in the process ( in other words not enough ‘specific details’).

The panel recommendations only described the public input as related to the specific agenda

items of the commission – not what the public thought was important. Overall, the commission’s

recommendations barely mentioned ecological issues and totally ignored equity issues.

An examination of the Washington State Department of Transportation 11 web site for public

outreach reveals one outreach effort to form focus groups in response to the failure of Referen-

dum 51 in 2003 on three subjects: A potential ‘better driving habits’ advertising campaign to re-

duce congestion, the use of tolls and HOT lanes and the update of the Washington Transportation

Plan – these three topics are two mice and an elephant. WSDOT spent $70,000 to gather 98 peo-

ple participated in 10 focus groups. The notable point here is that while most corporations spend

from 5% to 15% of their total budgets on market research, this agency spent only $70,000 to

gather public feedback information on tens of billions of dollars on capital improvements for up-

coming years. Compare this three order of magnitude difference to what a local company spends

on discovering the public’s needs and communicating the value of their products and services to

the public ( Sales and Marketing) in this area12

:

“S&M ( Sales and Marketing ) Spending as a Percent of Total Company Revenues - We asked our survey respondents to tell us the percent of total company revenue they spend on “all forms of sales and marketing,”

and we found that the overall average was 20.7%, with half of the companies in our sample reporting S&M spending between 12% and 26%. (As a point of reference, Microsoft currently spends 18%-19% of its reve-

nues on sales and marketing.) The real surprise, however, is that company size and product price seem to

have almost no impact on this ratio.”

The only other means of public engagement is the ballot box during the multi-year election

cycles – the equivalent of driving a car and only being able to steer only hard left or hard right

only for a few seconds on the freeway. The antagonist relations brought forward in this latent

content analysis reveal three important spheres of discourse within the public sphere, each with

their own argumentative style of knowledge production, and the information channels which link

them – The Executives, the Technical Experts, and the Public Participants.

Argument Theory (AT)

Public policy formation has, at its core, the critical discussion of potentially conflicting value

systems during deliberation, and how those values eventually expressed as public policies. Mar-

tin Wachs and Joseph L. Schofer 13

in “Abstract Values and Concrete Highways” note that the



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semantics and ambiguity of high-level abstractions of “Values, Goals, Objectives” are difficult to

translate into specific policies and plans, but there is a need to go still further, beyond the seman-

tics of the terms themselves to examine how the communicative processes present influence the

epistemological processes in the public sphere14, 15

. Recent developments in the area of Argu-

ment Theory provide a means of developing a typology of discourse for the information spaces

and transformations occurring between these discourse spheres while engaging in public policy

formation, and a means of characterizing them.

Also, a refinement and definition of deliberation itself and relating it to discourse was

needed, and it needed to be related to practical planning situations. There is much written at the

abstract level of ‘Communicative Action’ 16 and competing models of consensus, conflict, and

competition, such as “Agonistic Pluralism”17

and more other, more open frameworks18

. All

have roots in Searle, Grice and Austen and so all or any will require addressing the details of the-

ory around how people engage in discourse in public forums, and specifically in computer medi-

ated communication genres on the Internet. Argument Theory provides a means of linking socie-

tal discourse and identifying a potential theoretical model for reconciling these larger societal

discourse spheres with the communications of individuals engaging in deliberation

In Coalescent Argumentation19

, Michael Gilbert reconciles the varied schools of thought in

Argument Theory into a more overarching view, including the three historically important AT

approaches: Perelman‘s New Rhetoric, Toulmin and the DWC Model, and Naess‘ Precization.

These have informed later approaches, the Dialecticians, Grice and the Cooperative Principle,

the Speech Theorists, E. M. Barth’s Formalism, the Informal Logicians, Communication Theo-

rists, and recently Feminist contributions. Reviewing these models reveals three that can be as-

signed to our spheres of discourse – the Rhetorical, the Logical, and the Pragma-Dialectical.

We recognize that Rhetorical as the dominant tradition constructing the discourse sphere of

our politicians and public administrators ( the classic ‘debate’ format ), that formal logic domi-

nates in the positivist objective technical discourse sphere of planners and engineers, and theAmsterdam School around Pragma-Dialectics has specific qualities which align to the discourse

sphere of ordinary citizens. These three argument modes (Rhetorical, Logical, Dialectical) can be

used as the basis for a typology for examining the public policy discourse and demonstrate how

these fundamentally different methods of discourse cause inevitable disconnect with publics’

perception, epistemology and reaction to transportation policies.



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Towards a Discourse Typology

Each of these discourse spheres has a dominant (although not necessarily ‘pure’) quality of

argument mode and content semantics. The hierarchical nature of their respective information

spaces and decision support also differ markedly.

The ‘Executive’ (EX) sphere which consists of the policy and decision makers such as politi-

cians and top-level administrators relies on traditional ‘rhetorical’ mode, the ‘Technical Experts’

(TE) who are the engineers, planners, scientists and technical folks that operate in a ‘logical’

mode, and the ‘Public Participants’ (PP) use ‘Pragma-Dialectical’ mode ( See Figure 1). The

discourse channels inside and between these spheres have significant differences. The sequence,

origin and destination and return of the transformation loops between the spheres is significant

because it represents the power to control the frame, meaning, and content of the discourse, and

hence the production of knowledge.

This typology now permits placement and critique of the communicative artifacts and proc-

esses utilized during policy formation, such as surveys, elections, media, etc. and some selected

policy documents related to Puget Sound transportation policies. The control of the information

Order Channel Argument Theory Modes

1 PPPPPragma-Dialectical

2 TEPPLogical to Pragma-

Dialectical

3 PPEXPragma-Dialectical to Rhe-

torical

4 PPTEPragma-Dialectical

to Logical

5 EXPPRhetorical to

Pragma-Dialectical

6 TETELogical to Logical

7 EXTERhetorical to Logical

8 TEEXLogical to

Rhetorical

9 EXEXRhetorical

Figure 1. A typology identifying the discourse spheres in the public sphere, directional discourse channels, and importance to a public

participatory system.

Figure 2. Transformations between modes of Discourse and priority order for application in a participatory software system development analysis



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channels also gives insight into the power relationships by assignation of content production and

consumption, that of author and reader.

For example, currently there is little public deliberation as information flows between the

Executive discourse sphere and Technical discourse sphere and the public often can only begin

its discourse after a specific project is well along the design path, with a consequent generation

of lawsuits as the means of engagement.

Focus on the Pragma-Dialectical

This Discourse Typology now allows important system architecture decisions to be made.

Clearly, if our participatory software system was to serve the public participants, the primary in-

formation channel is purely based on Pragma-Dialectical meaning production, and the secondary

information channels involve transformations to and from the Logical and Rhetorical to the

Pragma-Dialectical. Our project can not possibly address either the purely Logical or Rhetorical

channel, or the information transformations between them, as they essentially happen behinf

closed doors.

Paraphrased from Gilbert, the Pragma-Dialectical approach for modeling argument interac-

tions relies on the actual practices and assertions of two or more persons arguing in a situation,

as opposed to an describing the argument as an ‘artifact’. The approach is ‘pragmatic’ because

they are concerned with the practical task of arguing and dialectic because they see argument as

a social process occurring between two arguers. It is based on Austin's and especially Searle’s

notion of speech acts 20. An argument is composed of individual speech acts that taken collec-

tively form a single speech act complex that establishes meaning. While this approach somewhat

ignores accidental or emotional effects, it does incorporate conditions of felicity, sincerity, rec-

ognition, satisfaction. This approach attempts to provide a model for argumentation while incor-

porating standards of rationality and orderliness. The major drawback to rigorous application of

this approach is that it ignores "elaborations, clarifications, anecdotes, and side-lines" which will

also have important information and meaning. While much argument simply does not follow asufficiently routine process to allow the identification of the requisite components for speech act

identification after the fact, this is can occur au priori within the constraints of a software system

if it based on speech act production.



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If the Pragma-Dialectic approach is adopted for modeling the participants’ interactions, what

follows is a description of the elements using Speech Acts. Also, since it promotes the interac-

tions in the Participants’ discourse sphere as a social activity, it allows us to seek existing analo-

gous venues on the Internet in order to extract important aspects of Speech act complexes using

qualitative methods. It also implies that existing content from other discourse spheres on the

channels must be transformed in order to be accessible to such a process. Most important, this

provides a powerful metaphor to guide the system architecture: that PgisT is essentially at its

core a ‘Conversation’.

Reflection

While it was gratifying and exciting to finally have a useful metaphor, this metaphor met ex-

treme resistance from my cohort on the research team. And rather than use the metaphor as the

guiding principle and basis for re-factoring and future design, already existing schema and proc-esses were merely superficially labeled with matching terminology. Also, this approach meant

software tools and applications which were well beyond the domain knowledge and experience

of the team – Natural Language Processing and Computational Linguistics. Also, since my edu-

cational background was primarily in engineering, physics, and math, and I had never taken even

the most basic English class, I was ill equipped to further this line of research.

These factors all denigrated my theoretical ideas to a ‘hunch’. Also, the conversational

functionality was positioned as ancillary supporting activity rather than as the core conceptual

model providing the spine for the entire information trajectory of the system. In retrospect, at this

point I became an outsider to the rest of the team. While I observed and accounted for their work

in my own design, there was very little synthesis with the other’s activities. However, despite

these negative impressions, an enthusiasm set in from the realization that my approach addressed

major flaws in existing conceptualizations of collaborative software systems.

Online venues and Communication Genres

Rather than a standard computer ‘application’, the system architecture should be based on

Computer Mediated Communication, which is potentially much more successful, because people

are fundamentally more interested in interacting with other people than yet another computer ap-

plication. Also, while it is extremely difficult to reconstruct meaning and context after the fact, it

is almost trivial to preserve conversational structures which allow reconstruction and further

processing. To identify the significant aspects of the system, a manifest content analysis of exist-



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ing online venues such as Blogs, Forums, List Servers, Chat Rooms, and Portals and communi-

cations genres such as E-mail, Instant Messaging and SMS/Text messaging (See Figure 2 a b).

This examination yielded a partial list of characteristic aspects which will influence the system

design.

Personalization – Can the messaging be formattedand timed for the convenience of the participant.

Unitization – How long are the messages, how ex-cerpts and quotes from previous messages are dis- played and structured.

Organization – How are messages and replies dis- played in the view, how is quoting handled.

Community – Are the same participants present over many topics over time, do they address each oth-ers posts, do they ask questions and help one an-other.

Intimacy – Are the participants known to each other,how is identify and anonymity handled.

Proximity and Presence – How are other users’synchronous activities visible. How is identityexpressed through profiles and posts.

Affinity - How is attention managed and filtered.How are other discussants with similar interestand views identified, do divisions and sides ap- pear.

Technical Proficiency – How difficult is it to learnand navigate the venue or genre, and gain useablecompetence.

Obligation – What is the perceived effort to read,interpret, and respond to respond to a specificmessage.

Coherence and divergence - Do people keep to the point, is it easy to track discussion threads andidentify stimulus response pairings.

Regulation - How do the participants and the systemencourage good behaviors and discourage / sanc-tion improper behaviors, are the rules explicit inan FAQ or are they implicit.

Author, Editor, and Reader – The relationships andlinkages and control.

Persistence – How long does the discussion last.

Immediacy and Latency - How fast and how manyreplies occur.

Mediums – Are other forms of content beyond plaintext used, such as images, sound, video and how isexternal content linked

Dissipation and disposition – How do discussionsgrow, branch, and terminate, the availability of ar-chives of past discussions.

Also, I acted as a participant observer, lurking in some, briefly participating in others, and es-tablished a well founded identity in some. Using e-mail and IM I experimented with discussing

transportation issues both with single persons and groups (See Figure 2 c). Instant Messaging

emerged as the preferred ‘genre’, but the only corresponding ‘venue’, the chat room, failed sub-

stantially in many aspects, especially coherence.

My participant observation was problematical on many fronts. Was my ‘Rationale’ for using

IM interaction as a pattern … really just a ‘Rationalization’? I am an expert computer user, tech-

nically proficient, a long time user of Instant Messaging for work and social purposes. I also en-

joy the instant gratification of feedback and its ease of access on my desktop. To mitigate these

issues I used autobiographical recollection of three examples of introducing people to instant

messaging and my observations of their adoption behaviors and their learning curves. These

were a middle aged fellow student with rudimentary computer experience in the context of a

joint class project, a senior citizen collaborating with me on the PgisT team, and a nine year old



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boy I was tutoring. All these were selected because they had significant barriers which would

inhibit their use of the IM. Additionally I sought quantitative market statistics on the overall

adoption of IM applications and registrations, both for personal and corporate use. However,

only an actual ad hoc structured interview experiment would validate the utility of IM patterns to

the system design.

A..Mass transit discussion on a newsgroup“alt,transportation.roads” on Google Groups Beta

B. Forum discussion on Slashdot about the implications of

tracking automobiles via GPS

C. Instant Messaging conversation on Microsoft Messenger

about personal experiences around traffic safety

Figure 2. Content analysis in Internet venues and genres to identify aspects of online public discussion



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Structure for the Interview

Since we are attempting to capture the individual’s perceptions and attitudes about the trans-

portation system, a concern elicitation strategy must be grounded in some cognitive theory. Also,

it is desirable to remove the influence of the researcher from the resulting responses as much as

possible.

A. Schematic of Lakoff’s Cognitive Linguistic Models A. Idealized Cognitive Model of Transportation Concerns

B. Subordinate, Basic and Super-ordinate levels B. Direct experiences related to language

C. Progression from the individual to larger scales C. Temporal schema for concern formation

Figure 3: Estate Space with Economic, Equity and Ecological

axes scaled outward from the individual citizen. Figure 4: Progression of Lakoff’s theory during the elici-

tation process, Participant’s ICMs are discovered which

are then progressively examined in a framework.



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Meanings in language change with time, scale and other contexts. The relationship between

the language of the participant and their own expression of language needs to be addressed. Ac-

cording to Lakoff 21, our use of language is a reflection of Idealized Cognitive Models (ICM)

formed from our individual experiences, that the semantics of concepts expressed in language

use falls into three general levels ( super-ordinate, basic, and subordinate), and that these ICMs

are fundamentally based on special metaphors. Since the platform is reliant on the Internet, the

primary mode of language use will be plain text. Since these ICMs are experiential, the questions

in the elicitation must progress from the person themselves outward to larger and more abstract

concepts to expose these three levels.

Another experiential guideline is to ask questions that require relation of direct sensory and

emotional experiences. People are confident in what the see, hear, smell, touch and feel emotion-

ally, and evoking these together aids recall, as opposed to inquiries which require abstract ideas

and interpretation. This guideline also generates the names of specific objects and locations. For

instance, people would be very descriptive about their own bus experiences but have less basis of

addressing the same question region wide without some au priori information or training.

To provide an attribute structure for establishing the context of the responses for later aggre-

gation with other individuals, a geospatial framework is used to structure the introduction and

progression of the questions from the initial concerns put forward by the participant. This frame-

work is essentially a generic coordinate system involving various aspects of sustainability. While

the complete framework involves multiple ‘Spaces’ of Purview, Estate, Location, and Topology,

only the Estate Space involving axes of Equity, Environment, and Economics is used for the

concerns elicitation in the interviews. This framework was derived from Stilwell’s 22 frame-

works consisting of three triads defining the relationship between economy-society-ecology,

market-state-community, and the local-national-global scales. This was unified and expanded

into a structure for the elicitation interview.

The interview follows the basic conversational patterns put forward by the Rubins

23

, wherethe interview is constructed as a conversation (albeit via an Internet genre metaphor such a In-

stant Messaging) rather than a business form. Previous responses to ‘main questions’ are used to

generate further “follow up questions” to extract more detail. Using the Internet conversational

metaphor has many advantages of automatic logging and replication of the same protocol to

many people in parallel.



17

This framework provides contextual dimensions of the constituent concepts within the inter-

view discourse and be conceived as an n-space ‘volume’ composed of related 'Spaces' of Pur-

view, Estate, Location, and Trajectory. Here, a ‘Space’ is defined as a conceptual area reserved

for some particular purpose, independent of it’s constituents, which will allow the production of

extended meanings. These 'Spaces' are separated by underlying models for representation, and

include the spectrum between the objective and subjective. Each 'Space' can further described as

mutually dependent axes that allow the discourse concepts to be unpacked and situated in rela-

tion to other concepts. The centrality, the upper/lower limits, and distribution of a concept's vol-

ume can be determined along the various axes.

The dimensions of particular value concepts can then be extended in relation to the entire

framework, and placed in relation to other values. The 'context' of a particular value can then be

related to other values to produce a value network or concept map. The attempt here is not to

achieve mathematical rigor, but rather to allow relationships, gaps and linkages to be identified

or discovered. These contexts can then be further refined using a soft systems theory approach to

identify the values, goals, objectives and criteria. This eventually provides a means to derive hi-

erarchies such as decision trees from a particular perspective to apply decision support tech-

niques.

Elicitation Strategy

The elicitation strategy has eight basics stages. The first requests the basic information about

the person’s Zip+4, geo-demographic segment self-identification, and transportation modes the

person is familiar with, and their tour. The second phase asks an open question of what their

general concerns about transportation in the Puget Sound area are, and they can list as many

phrases as they feel are needed. This provides the super-ordinate level of Lakoff’s schema and

these topics are then used to generate topics at the basic and subordinate level. The noun phrase

used in these concerns are extracted manually or using Computational Linguistic techniques in-

volving Natural Language / Shallow Text Processing and explored further by questions prompt-ing them to relate their direct sensory experiences in the present, the past, and a prediction along

the Time Axes.

This temporal bracketing is essential to draw out the particular nature of the change that is

being related by the interviewee, along with the coordinate terms relating to the concept. The

particular order of approach to each time period is crucial. The most immediate memory is re-



18

called within the concept frame, this then allows the more distant memory to be evoked depend-

ing on the same frame. By invoking the prediction, the interviewee is prodded into recalling the

specific nature of the change in order to extrapolate into the future, further refining the concept.

And finally, being asked how they would resolve the change in the future provides a summary

synthesis of the concept.

Estate Space is then addressed

for a single concern topic brought

forth in the initial regional con-

cern listing. A series of questions

is then generated along each of

the three axes (Equity, Environ-

ment, and Economic) from the

individual outward. The partici-

pant is asked to extrapolate the

effects through a range of scales

to detect values shifts and coordi-

nate terms for this single concern.

For the Equity Axis, the questions range from ‘Yourself’ through ‘Wife (or significant other),

Children, Relatives, Parents’, ‘Neighbors’, ‘Citizens of the City’, ‘Citizens of the Area’, ‘Citi-

zens of the Puget Sound’ region, ‘Citizens of Washington State’, ‘Citizens of the United States

of America’, and to the ‘Global Population’. For the Environment Axis, the questions range from

the ‘Home’ through the ‘Neighborhood’, ‘Seattle-Tacoma-Everett Metropolitan area’, ‘Western

slope of the Cascades (Vancouver B.C. to Portland) Area’, out to the ‘Planetary Biosphere’. The

Economic Axis expands from ‘Yourself’ through to ‘Neighborhood Residents’, ‘Seattle-Tacoma-

Everett metropolitan area residents’, ‘State of Washington Economy’, ‘GNP of the United

States’, and the ‘World Economy’.

By starting each axes of questions from the person themselves and the outward to larger con-

cepts allows a graduated progression of value examination from what topics they know most in-

timately outward to those less known and more abstract. Also, previous statements are recalled

into short term memory and confirmation and contradiction with following statements becomes

evident.

Figure 5: Transportation Concerns Elicitation Process



19

The text generated during

these responses is tagged

with the appropriate context

as it occurs and is then used

to generate a narrative (See

Appendix 1) for examina-

tion by the participant,

where they can evaluate

whether their perspective

has been adequately cap-

tured. The text is then proc-

essed to extract a rough

concept map (Figure 6) us-

ing lexical chain process-

ing; the main noun phrase

is used as a node on which

other nodes are joined ac-

cording to their lexical

proximity to the main con-

cept. This technique allows

for detailed elicitation of

concerns while allowing

those concerns to be aggregated and used in further deliberative processes, such as brain storm-

ing and structured discussion in Delphi or NGT sessions.

Online Interview Compared with Face-to Face (F2F)

An internet based interview will differ in many significant ways from a face to face interview.

Any Internet based method should be compared and confirmed against the same process in face

to face personal interview to note important behavioral differences and take the opportunity to

refine and clarify the methodology. The interview structure used in the IM sessions was used in a

face to face setting. The goal was to compare the ‘endurance’ of the interviewee, and compare

the time required in an F2F (Face to Face) and Internet IM interview, and then extrapolate that to

Figure 6: Lexical Cluster from NLP/STP transformed into Sense Clusters, ex-ample shows ‘Telework' concern using the Realms framework, insets are de-

tailed views of the clusters



20

any future automated or semi-automated process.

Another goal was to examine the length of responses

and the need for clarification and to use the face to

face interview to refine the IM questions. The inter-

views were also examined for transitions and con-

tradictions as each axes of questions progressed

outward. Both the IM and F2F interview results

were also used to query the subject about epistemo-

logical processes and hermeneutics of the resulting

narratives.

Both the IM and Face-to-Face involved a very

large time commitment by both the researcher –

several hours for the comprehensive and extensive

progression attempted. The IM approach does offer

several future avenues to mitigate this time com-

mitment. For the researcher, using Natural Language

Processing to extract the key phrases on the fly to

generate the follow on question has the possibility of

automating or semi-automating the process. Suchautomation does have the drawback of limiting the

ability for the interviewee and the researcher to ask for clarification and deeper probing; on the

other hand it would have the ability of ensuring that the same structure would be followed during

multiple interviews. Automating would also allow the researcher and the subject to operate asyn-

chronously, reducing scheduling difficulties and allowing one researcher to address many inter-

views. Also, while committing to a continuous several hour block is difficult, automation or

semi-automation would allow the interview to be stopped and restarted as needed. The online

method also allows greater time for the subject to consider there responses without considering

the in person obligation to answer immediately. Both the IM and the F2F seemed to require ap-

proximately the same total contact time to complete. IM also has a vast improvement over F2F in

that transcription is occurring by default and is bottlenecked by transcription expertise, process-

ing time and cost.

PgisT: What things or events do you actually experience

TODAY or YESTERDAY, particularly those things you see,

hear, touch, feel (emotional reactions), and smell, that deter-

mined why you said " Crosswalks are dangerous because

people don't like to stop. Rush, rush, rush. "

Participant: There have been a number of people killedcrossing at crosswalks in Redmond. That leaves an impres-

sion. Hard to miss a person in the middle of the street. Shows

a lack of carelessness on the part of drivers. We need a mas-

sive re-education program if we plan to get people to walk

anywhere. That is, the drivers need to be educated - and per-

haps the pedestrians who ALWAYS have to be on guard.

Participant: Shows carelessness, not a lack of carelessness.

Sometimes I can't think and type.

PgisT: What things or events do you actually experience

TODAY or YESTERDAY, particularly those things you see,

hear, touch, feel (emotional reactions), and / or smell, that

determined why you said "It's two plus miles from my

house to the nearest store. Anyone with arthritis has a

horrible time walking that distance without huge amounts

of pain. "

Participant: Pain. Walking on rough roads is harder than

walking on a sidewalk if you have a disability. Expecting

those with disabilities to walk on rough roads is unrealistic.

And walking long distances is also problematic anyway.

Figure 7: Asking for direct sensory experience in

an excerpt of an online interview as a conversa-

tion using Instant Messaging.



21

Responses to the questions in both the IM and F2F were comparable (but this sample is too

small to make any general conclusions). Length was generally similar to a paragraph, generally

with several sentences well directed to the question. Many answers involved multiple para-

graphs, indicating the need in an automated process of allowing the respondent to continue as

much as they would like, which would contra-indicate the use of a standard web form which

would pre-impose limitations or perceptions of the quantity needed. The greatest difficulty was

around communicating the need for direct sensory experience ( Figure 7) rather than interpreta-

tion or general conclusions, but in all cases in both IM and F2F the respondents ‘got the hang of

it’ eventually. This would indicate that in any automated or semi-automated scenario a ‘training’

session, very explicit instructions, preparatory examples or all the preceding should be given be-

fore the actual interview process.

IM mitigated one serious issue, the influence of the researcher to get a particular sort of re-

sponse. Based on requests for clarification from the subjects, in both the IM and F2F situations

the communication of the particular geographic scale in effect for a given question needs to be

refined. Communicating the notion of ‘Equity’ needs further work – while all subjects seemed to

have a ready idea of ‘Economic issues’, and also with ‘Environmental’ issues, ‘Equity’ issues

were always cast in terms of these other two axes.

It was relatively easy to observe value shifts as the questions and replies moved from the

personal outward to larger scales. Several this times a contradiction was evident to the subject

themselves. In one IM interview, the respondent was asked about ‘Zoning Changes’ at personal

level, then at the neighborhood level:

“I would like no zoning changes … but I expect they will move to commercial possibly within 10 years for this

house I live in now ... yes, I did say that … I think they are selfish and lack social consideration.. .lol … No, not

exactly, but I agree I was taking this from a "self" perspective … but I am sure other 'self's" have the same view

… I think my recommendations would help everyone who commutes in the area …”

The self realization of a ‘selfish’ viewpoint was confronted at the city level, and as the pro-

gression moved to larger scales, a more equanimous attitude appeared:

“We are all in this together … all roads lead to Rome … Or so they say … all changes lead to everyone … and

thus they should … I think the state is taking traffic in consideration with it's zoning”

This indicates that the proposed interview structure has the possibility of detecting the subtle

qualities of ‘NIMBY’ (Not in My Back Yard) which confounds planners composing and future

changes in policies and projects. Even a superficially ‘win-win’ traffic mitigation strategy like

‘Telework’ elicited a potential counter narrative when addressed at the global scale:



22

“Likely make the poor countries even poorer and the wealthy countries even wealthier unless

we can create literate societies with a good IT infrastructure and food.”

In the F2F interview for instance, the subject realized that while his proposed solution of

massive highway construction would help existing commuters, it would have detrimental effects

on fuel conservation and climate in the long term. Jonathan Swift is attributed with saying “It is

useless to attempt to reason a man out of a thing he was never reasoned into.” The elicitation of

these self generated contradictions and counter narratives is the most valuable product of this

strategy. These provide valuable points for beginning deliberation within specific frames during

follow on discussions.

The questions were stripped and the respondent’s answers were extracted, grouped and as-

sembled into a narrative form (Appendix 1) to allow the interviewee to examine the totality of

their elicited perspectives to provide a hermeneutic evaluation. The interview is very structuredand ‘conversational’, the answers are very specific to the framed questions at the moment. When

these responses are aggregated, it is important to verify that their totality is representative of the

meanings the interviewee would wish to impart. The respondents were asked to comment on the

assembled narrative, and all agreed that it did capture their perspective in a synoptic sense. The

interview also has an epistemological effect, there is knowledge building occurring as the con-

cepts are elicited along the various axes. All agreed that the interview process had also helped

them clarify their own ideas about the subject matter, and expressed a desire to learn more in ar-

eas where they found themselves lacking well founded ideas or opinions. So such a structured

interview was not neutral, it does not leave the subject the same as when it started. This is valu-

able if this is the first step in a further deliberative process, but could be questionable if the re-

search agenda is not meant to influence the subjects. Thus, if such an interview is accomplished,

we are positioning ourselves as activist researchers.24, 25

Linguistics Processing

The IM respondent’s answers were processed to extract noun phrases using Natural Lan-

guage Processing / Shallow Text Processing (NLP/STP). To test the ability of NLP/STP to cap-

ture the relevance and meaning of the responses, the keywords were concatenated into a Google

Advanced Search query. The results list was very small and contained predominantly documents

very relevant to the specific subject and geographical location of the response – considering that



23

this query was executed against the World Wide Web, and not a more limited corpus, this dem-

onstrated the robustness of using NLP/STP for capturing the essence of the subject’s text.

Conclusion

Prof. Mao P Kwan called for the need for ‘Hybrid Geographies’

26

– that qualitative andquantitative methods inform and support one another, rather than being exclusionary of each

other. At the root of every quantitative model is first a qualitative process of deciding which fac-

tors will be accounted for in the quantitative model. Additionally, software design itself is at the

beginning informed by qualitative process in narratives, user stories and use cases. While she

may claim equality of these at the theoretical level, a participatory software system is dominated

by the use of qualitative methods, in design, in the situation, and in the operational dynamics.

Using various forms of discourse and textual analysis at multiple scales can yield the substantiat-

ing patterns and aspects which enable us to codify such a system into technological artifacts of

software and hardware and allow capture of multiple perspectives from participants in their own

words, and support further deliberative processes. By using the geographical principles of scale

and structures operating at multiple scales to guide the structuring of the interview process, a rich

and robust narrative of the individual’s significant personal experiences can be captured in their

own words. Using qualitative methods applied to Internet technologies potentially allows the re-

searcher to greatly scale the number of participants and the depth of there responses. Using soft-

ware technologies such as NLP/STP allows these responses to be incorporated into larger delib-

erative processes while preserving their unique individual qualities, and can aid in the generation

of tools such as concept and theme maps. The use of qualitative methods combined with

NLP/STP provides a robust foundation for a participatory software system.



24

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1. Konstadinos Goulias (2003) “Transportation SystemsPlanning”, CRC Press, NY

2 Nyerges T., Brooks T., Drew C., Jankowski P., Ruther-ford G. S., and Young R. (2003), “An Internet Platform toSupport Public Participation in Transportation DecisionMaking”, National Science Foundation Grant Proposal

3. Goulias, K.C. (2000). Travel behavior and values researchfor human-centered transportation systems. “Transporta-tion in the New Millennium”. Transportation ResearchBoard, National Academy of Sciences, Washington.http://www4.nationalacademies.org/trb/homepage.nsf/we

b/millennium_ papers

4. Stephenson N., “In the Beginning...Was the CommandLine”, (1999), Harper Perennial

5. Iain Hay, Ed. 2000. Qualitative Research Methods In Human Geography. Oxford University Press.

6 England, Kim V.L. 1994. “Getting Personal: Reflexiv-ity, Positionality, and Feminist Research.” Professional

Geographer 80-89. (Course Reader)

7. Eppel N., “Security Absurdity: The Complete, Unques-tionable, And Total Failure of Information Security. - Along-overdue wake up call for the information securitycommunity.” (2006)http://www.securityabsurdity.com/failure.php

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9. Carlson J. 2005, Guest columnist The reason folksflocked to the gas-tax-repeal initiative, The Seattle TimesThursday, August 4, 2005http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/opinion/200241926

7_carlson04.html10. The Blue Ribbon Commission On Transportation, Final

Recommendations to the Governor and Legislature, De-cember, 2000, Seattle, Washington 98101

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16. Habermas J 1987, The Theory of Communicative

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tionalist Reason

17. Mouffe C, For an agonistic public sphere

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Studies in Social and Political Thought

19. Gilbert M 1997, Coalescent Argumentation, Michael A.,1997, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc. Mahwah NJ

20. Smith B, 2003, “John Searle: From Speech Acts to SocialReality”. ontology.buffalo.edu

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Things : What categories reveal about the mind ,

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Appendix 1: Participant Narrative

Concern ElicitationResident of 98053-7408

DoyouonlywantcurrentordoyouwhatIhavedoneinthepastvis-a-vistransportionoptions?…Rightnow…Iliveinasingle-familydwellinginthesuburbs.…Redmond.Notwealthy.Notupper-income.Justfrugal.Closeto3with- outthemoneyandwithoutthehigh-poweredjob.…. It'samixedneighborhoodofexpensivehomesandmiddle- classfolks.…Ipersonallydonotknowanyonewitha6figureincome.Housesarespreadout.Someyoung,somemiddle-aged,afewelderlyfolks.

Transportation Use

Trajectory ‘Space’

Definecarpool,,,Howmanypeople?…IuseSOVoccasionally,carpool(2),andbus.Ihaveusedtrainandbikeinthepast.…Ithinkit'simportanttosaythatItendtobatchshoppingprojects.e.g.Iwillgoto thegrocerystore,bank, library,other sites,butusuallyonlyifIdotwoormoreactivities....Iproba- bly goshopping twicea weekbycarpool(2 people). Travel to downtownRedmondviaAvondale,

mainstreets.Itendtotravelafter9:30amto11:30and between2:20and 4:00pm tokeep out ofthemaintrafficflows.IfIhavetogotothedentistordoctorsItravelwhenevertheappointmentis.…So,Imakeatleasttwotripsoutperweek,occasionallythreebut mostly I stay home and work. Pathetic.Wow,I'm thelastperson toaskaboutroutesandstreetnames.Imemorizehowtogetthereandba- sicallystickwiththatroute.….WhileIstarteddrivingearly,Ididn'tactuallygetmylicensetillIwas40.Iguess I just feel more comfortable going withsomeone else. … Actually, I guess it's SOV, butmostlytherearemyselfandmySOinthecar,thuscarpool. We do things together. … Already an-

swered that.While I starteddriving early, I didn'tactuallygetmylicense tillI was40. Iguess Ijustfeelmorecomfortablegoingwithsomeoneelse.I'mnotveryadventurous.AndItendtobelazywhenitcomestodriving.…ILOVEthebus!!!!!!Inthepastwhen Iprimarilyusedthebus Ihad somuch funwiththeotherpassengers.NowIlikeitforthecon- venience.Sincethebuscompaniesstartedrunning

bussestoRedmondmoreoften-atleastonceanhour-IcangetintotheUWordowntownandbackout again very easily.Who wouldn'twant to takethebuswhenit'ssoconvenient.…Don'tuseabikenow.Thatwas apastevent. …Too dangerous toride a bike.People don't see you and they don'tcareaboutyou.Nope,toodangerous.…Ilikethetrain because it is easy, inexpensive, and allowsmeachoiceofthingstodo.Icanknit,read,watchamovieorcombineactivities.Eventalktopeople.Ilike the train better than the bus even if it costsmore. 'Course the distances are greater by train,too.

Concern Topics

Location ‘Space’:

At the Local / Neighborhood Level

Hardlyanysidewalksmeanit'sdangeroustowalk.…Crosswalksaredangerousbecausepeopledon'tliketostop.Rush,rush,rush.…It'stwoplusmilesfrommyhousetotheneareststore.Anyonewitharthritishasahorribletimewalkingthatdistancewithouthugeamountsofpain.…Studentsmostlydonotlivewithinwalkingdistanceoftheirschools.Bussingthemhasledtoanepidemicofobesity.Alsoforthemid- dle-agedandelderly.Eitherstoresarenotconvenientorstreetsarenotsafe.…Guessthatcoversmostofthelocal/neighborhoodissues.

At the City Level

LiveintheCounty.RightacrossthestreetisthecityofRedmondbutwearecounty.…Actuallythey'rethesameasmentionedpreviously.PerhapsbecauseofwhereIlivethetransportationissuesappeartobethesame.…IwouldlovetoliveinaplacewhereIcouldwalktoshopsbutnotifIhavetoliveinatotallyurbanenvironment.

At the Regional LevelIthinkthecityplannerslefttheplanningofaunifiedtransportationsystemtoolate.Noforesight.Thelandwhereagoodtransportationsystemcouldhavebeenputisnowfullofveryexpensivehouses.Thesefolksmustknowwherethegrowthisoccurringandwhereitislikelytooccur.Buttheydon'tseemtohaveplannedforhavingthetransportationsysteminplacetomeetthatgrowth.IshouldbeabletogetfromonelargecityontheWestsideofthemountainstoanotherviaaunifiedtransportationsystem.Itshouldbeaseasyformetogettoamini-mallanywhereintheregionfrommyhomeasitistogetfrommyhousetodowntownSeattleortheUW.

ObservationsNot surewhat you want here.… I don'tget emotionalaboutthesethings.IambasingmythoughtsonwhatI

seearoundme:driverswith littleconcern forpedestri- ans.…Andrecklessdriving.…Doesbeingforcedoffthe



roadintotheditchbysomeoneonacellphonecount?…My roadhas whatamounts toblind curvesonit. I al- wayshave tobe onguard. That takes away from theenjoyment.IusuallydrivetosomeplaceIcanwalk,andthenwalk.Therehavebeenanumberofpeoplekilledcrossing at crosswalks in Redmond. That leaves animpression.Hardtomissapersoninthemiddleofthe

street.Showsalackofcarelessnessonthepartofdriv- ers. We need a massive re-education program if weplantogetpeopletowalkanywhere.Thatis,thedriversneedtobeeducated-andperhapsthepedestrianswhoALWAYShavetobeonguard.Showscarelessness,nota lack of carelessness. Sometimes I can't think andtype.…

Pain.Walkingonroughroadsisharderthanwalkingonasidewalkifyouhaveadisability.Expectingthosewithdisabilities to walk on rough roads is unrealistic. Andwalking longdistances is alsoproblematic anyway. ….Students mostly do not livewithin walking distanceoftheir schools.Bussing themhas led toan epidemicofobesity. Also for the middle-aged and elderly. Eitherstoresarenotconvenientorstreetsarenotsafe."…

I'm in public health and many of the discussions areabouthowthebuiltenvironmenthasmadeitimpossiblefor manyK-12 students towalk totheirschools.Withlack of exercise and a really bad diet at school, thenumberofobesekidsisrisingprettyswiftly.We'vecre- atea non-walking,school-busdependentenvironment.Also the big schoolsmean fewer of them and longerdistancestoreachthem.2.5milesisthedistancebeforebussingstarts-andthatjustmeansthekidsaredriventoschoolbytheirparents.Sonoexercisethereeither.…

Suburbanlivingmeansthatstoresarelongdistances.Iwouldhavetodrivetotheneareststoretobuyanything.Therearetradeoffs.…Puttingmyselfintheseniorcate- gory, here.… LOL. Iwant the amenities of rurallivingwiththeamenitiesofanurbanenvironment.It'sjustnotgoingtohappen.…Iusedtolovewalkingandstillwouldifitwasn'tsopainful.…Ican'tmovefromonecityorpartof a city to another easily. This makesme more de- pendentonmycar.…I supposeI couldlivein aruralretirementcommunitywithall theamenities. If I couldaffordit.…

Oh,yes.Teleworkismyfavoritetopic.Istronglybelievethatanywhitecollarworkerwhoisprojectorientedandwhoisaself-starterisperfectfortelework.IdiditonedayaweekwhenIwasattheUWandIgotsomuchmoredoneonthoseFridaysthanwhenIwasattheU.Nointerruptions.Notransportationcosts.Nirvana.So,Ihavestrongfeelingsabouttelework.Itisaverypositive

experience.…Hum. I'm not exactly sureof this, but I do know thatpeople havebreak-evenpoints that varywith the person. I'vealways felt thatthebuseswerea gooddeal.Thattakingthetraininsteadofdrivingmademuchmoresensedueto thecosts, butif transportationcostshadgoneuptoomuch,Imighthavechangedmymindanddriven. … Course, this is my personal feeling abouttransportation.Ihavefriendswhodislikethesmellofthebuses(Itneverbotheredme),andwaiting(IreadwhenIwait, or knit). …Well, if I were marketing to people, Iwouldemphasizehowmuchmoneytheycouldsavebytakingthebus-anddoitinrealdollars($4.00roundtripvs.costofcar,gas,insurance,maintenance,etc).Alsoemphasizewhatyoucandowhilecommutingviabus(I

use bus for any transportation mode except cars). Iwould also put wirelessaccess on the buses so thatpassengerscoulddotheiremailandgetaquickstartontheday.ForthatIwouldpayextra.…

405 isalwaysbusy.Toomanycars.Not enough roadfor the numberof cars.The two bridges are like that,too.Verybusy,hardlyatimewhentherearen'tmassesoftraffic. … I assume that the traffic lights need tobechangedtoreflectchangingtrafficflows.Ifthelightsaresetuptoletfewerpeoplethroughoneway,thelineoftrafficwill buildand causefrustration. I assume somekind of notification system might alleviate the "roadrage"thatsomepeoplefeelwhentheycan'tmovecouldbe lessened. … Wow. I never thought of the carpoollanesbeing jugged up. What a dreadful thought! … I

haveexperiencedthetrafficcongestionthatotherper- sonspokeofandtrytomakemylifeeasierbytravelingwhentheroadsarenotquitesocrowded.Seetimesinstatementat(2:09:54PM).Ialsoleaveearlyintheamifgoingonaroadtripviacar.



BaselineInthepastIcouldjumpoutofthewayfasterthanIcannow. …. It seems as if driverswere more concernedaboutpedestrians in the past.Now theyarepreoccu- piedwithgettingplacesasfastastheycan,withtalkingon the phone, and with eating and drinking as theydrive.Hastodowithfeelingthepressureoftime,Ithink.Itseemstobeworsenowthaninthepast.Muchworse.Also,stopandstarttrafficmeansthatmanypeoplereadwhiletheywaitforthenextforwardmovement.….Well,Ididn'thavearthritisinthepastandwalkingtwomileswasnothingformetodoregularly.One'sabilitytowalkeasilygetsconstrainedasyougetolder-well,atleastfor some of us. Now I need a smooth place to walk.Evenhikingisoutofthequestion.…Hikingisoutofthequestion unless the path is really smooth. Jarring mykneeshurtslikeaSOB.…

Withgatedcommunitiessuchaswehavenowbutlesssointhepast,studentstendtogetdriventoschoolortheygetbussed.Ialwayswalkedtoschoolbutthentheschoolswere not more than 1.5 milesaway.But that

was longer ago than10years.The problemofpoorlyplanned neighborhoods has been going on for longerthan10yearsandsohastheincreaseinobesity.Hu- mansaremeanttowalkandwesufferfromobesityandaccompanying chronic diseases when we don't. Theelderly tend to gain weight as they get older sincethey're less likely to exercise. I don't think that haschangedmuch although I know that seniors did walkmoreinthepastthantheydonowandweremoreac- tive. … I never thought about the availability of shopsbefore.

WhenIlivedinthecityIcouldalwaysbustoshoppingareas.NowlivinginthesuburbanenvironmentIhavetodrive.…Inthepastthereweren'tsomanymalls.LOL.Iknow that planning has always been a problem. Not

surehow toget around the issueofshort-timer politi- cianswithshortenedlong-views.IguessIhavegreaterexpectationsifthetransportationsystemnow.Iexpecttobeabletogetanywhereintheregioneasily.Ididnotexpectthatinthepast.…IexpectREGIONALplanning.Notlocal,now.AndthereisnoreasonfornotplanningregionallywhatwithGISandall.…

Inthepastnotasmanypeoplecouldaffordtwocars.Now itis not uncommonto have two ormore cars.Itseemstomethatpeople expectedto take the bus towork.Course,oncepeoplemovedtothesuburbs,thatideachanged.Ithinkmanymanagersareafraidtotrusttheiremployeestoworkathomesothatitdoesn'tseemthat usingteleworkto reduce traffic isan option.Thisshould be part of REGIONAL planning. Employerswhereverpossibleshouldbegivenminortaxbreakstoencourage teleworkat leastthree timesa week.Thatwould benefit all of uswith less pollution, less traffic,andlessgasused.….

Costoftransportationhasbeensteadilyincreasingover

the years(myperception). It's hard tofindbus ticketsand sometimes folks forget to get change for theticket/money machine. Just a small inconvenience.Think there should bemoresupport of transportation.Therewillneedtobe.Thefolkswhocanleastaffordtotakebusaretheoneswhocan'taffordacar.Ialwayspurchasedayear-longbuspasssoIneverhadtoworryabout money. Maybe everyone should be issued aninexpensive bus pass and forget about getting cashfrompassengers.….I didn'tthinkmuchabouttranspor- tationinthepastbecauseitalwayswasthereforme.…ExceptwhenImovedtoRedmondandthebussesonlyranduringpeakhours.IfIgotsickIstayedatworktillthebusesranagain.

PredictionI expect that most roads will have sidewalks. Out inRedmonditseemsthatwhenanewsubdivisiongoesinsidewalksarebeingputinatthesametime.That'sgoodnews.Nowifwecouldonlyretrofitroadswithoutalltheexpense.Itlooksasifdangerouscrosswalksarebeingsetupwithflashinglightsintheroadandabove.ThatislikelywhatwillhavetohappenonadditionalXwalks.…Weneedamassivereeducationmediaeventtoreminddrivers and pedestrians about their responsibilities inusing crosswalks. Won't reach everyone, but will getmany.…Makesomeoneelsedrive?OrderviatheInter- net? Live closer to stores?Continue to drive? Pay aneighbor to shop for me? The arthritis will only get

worsesoIwillhavetofigureoutdifferentwaysofget- tingaround.…Neighborhoodsaregoingtohavetoberetrofittedwithpathsalongsidehousessokidscangetthroughwalls/barrierstotheirschools.

Smaller schools (better for students anyway) or homeschoolingwithlotsofoutdoorexercise.Elderswilllikelyfigureoutwaysofexercising,perhapsonexercisema- chines. Doesn't solve the problem of inconvenientstores but thatwillhavetobe solved inotherways. …Limitationofactivitiesisgoingtobearealproblemfor

societyinanother10yearswhatwithalluspre-boomersandboomersretiring.…Iplantobuymynexthouseinareally ruralareaandjustdrivemy car untilI can'tanymoreandthenIwillgointoaretirementcommunityrightinsome largedowntownarea close toshops, restau- rants,etc.Seniorsmustberealisticabouttheirabilities.

Idon'texpectthesituationwithplannersandourpoliti- cianstochangeanytimeinthefuture.We'lljuststumblealonguntiltheinfrastructuregetsbuiltdespiteourworstefforts.Courseitwillcostalotmorethatway.…Ifullyexpect that teleworkwill be promoted by the government.Withpoliticianswithavestedinterestinkeepingthe oil flowing itwon't besoon. Alsowemayhave to

makesomehardchoicesinthefuture.Ifitmeanskeep- ingwarminthewinterordrivingacar,Ithinkmostpeo- plewouldvoteforheat.Teleworkwillsavegasthatcanbeusedto keepuswarm. Ialsothinkweneedto beinvesting heavily in sun-based / alternative fuel technologies.We'regetting a good start with the new hy- brids.Butthisdoesn'tgetpeopleoutoftheircars.Tele- workmight.Expensivegasmight.But,Iamnothopefulforthelatter.Salarieswilljustrisetocoverthecostofgas(Ithink).



…IexpectthatbuspriceswillcontinuetoincreasebutIalsohopethattherewillbe supportforthosewithlowincomes.If youwantpeopleworkingyoumayhave tosupplement their transportation. No supplements forthosewhoarenotreceiving foodstamps! …Think I'vealreadygivena responseto this question.Badme. …Well,ifIweremarketingtopeople,Iwouldemphasize

howmuchmoney theycould savebytakingthebus-anddoitinrealdollars($4.00roundtripvs.costofcar,gas, insurance, maintenance, etc). Also emphasizewhatyoucandowhilecommutingviabus(Iusebusfor

anytransportationmodeexceptcars).Iwouldalsoputwirelessaccessonthebusessothatpassengerscoulddotheiremailandgetaquickstartontheday.ForthatIwould pay extra. Somehow those using public healthtransportation need to understand the cost-benefit/economicsof usingpublictransportation.Maybeitwillhavetocomedownto"patriotism"orsomethingsimilar.

Maybethepriceofgaswillrisesomuchthatitwillforcepeople into public transportation. I just don'tknow. …That should be "Somehow those NOT using publictransportation..."

GoalsWhat should happen?Too many cars: Figureoutwaysofencouragingpeopletocar-pool or ride public transportation. Plan subdivisions so thatpeoplecanwalk.There'sgoodworkbeingdonebysomeinno-vativearchitectswho arecreating idealizedcommunitieswithno street parking, walkable neighborhoods and integratedhomesandshops.

The Roads: Create walkable roads. Plan roads, neighbor-hoods,transportationsystemfor20,30,50yearsoutandworktowardsthatplan,makingchangeswhennecessary.

Not Enough Emphasis: Change the emphasis. People aredyingearlybecauseofpoorplanning.Figureoutwaysofwork-ingwithallstakeholders, thepublic,publichealth, transporta-tionplanners,architects,etc.

Telework: Changepublicopinion.Telework shouldbean op-tion for those suited to it.Newemployees should request it,employersshouldbeencouragedtopromoteitandofcourse,soshouldgovernment-evenmorethanitisdoingnow.Tele-workmaybeanissueiftheterroristscontinuetokillfolksdur-ingrushhour.Noonewantstobeblownupduringtheircom-mutetowork.

The Feds: Employees and thepublicneed topressurelargeagenciestomovefasteronimplementingtelework.

Gas Prices Wow.Wehavetousemuch lessofit.Moreem-phasison alternativefuelsources includingsolarenergy,bio-

gas/methane,hydrogen,etc.

Buses: Make buses more comfortable, more technologyfriendlysothatpeoplecanworkastheygointowork,iftheywantto.

Alternative Kinds ... Transportation: IlikewhatthoseinDCaredoing.TherearepickupspotswherethosetravelinginaSOVcanstopandpickuppassengers.Notalkingtothedriverbutyou can knit, read, etc. No pay also. The advantage to thedriveristhats/hegetstousetheHOVlanes.So,setuppickupspotsandpromotetheidea.Hum,runningoutofideas.

Non-Car Transportation Modes: "Mare'sshank".Makeiteasiertogetaroundby walkingandregionally.Wouldalsoopenupopportunities forsmallerruralareastolurecustomerstotheirshopsiffolkscouldgettothemeasilyandtheyhad"stuff"thatfolkswantedtobuy.

Potential Riders: Mediablitzaboutmoney/timesavingsofpub-lictransportation.Also,healthreasons:lessstresstocommuteviabusthantodrive.

The Nearest Store: Dunnowhat to do about that.Sort of acatch-22.Noonewalkssoneighborhoodstoresareaproblemand few walk to stores because there aren't any in theneighborhood.

Anyone ... Arthritis ... A Horrible Time ... That Distance ... HugeAmounts ... Pain: Closer stores, neighborhoods withgood/smoothsidewalks,safeplacestowalkandplacestorestafterawalk-benches.Frontporchessothatpeoplecanseeeachotherandvisit.

Students: Easieraccessto schools.Schoolsshouldbe closerto neighborhoodswhere there area lotof school-aged kids.Movethedamnschoolifnecessary.Theydon'thavetobesolarge.Backtotheone-roomschoolhouse,LOL.

Walking Distance: Walkingdistance, hum. That's amile oramileandahalfoneway.Not2.5miles.

Their Schools: Schools should be closer to neighborhoodswhere there are a lot of school-aged kids. Move the damn

schooldifnecessary.An Epidemic ... Obesity: Better education.We have a hugenumberoffolkswithdiabetes.Weneedtoencouragefolkstoridethebusandtowalkplaces.

Streets:Walkable.Sidewalks.Safe.

Shops: Walkable. Safe. Appropriate for neighborhoods.Plannedinadvance.

A Totally Urban Environment: Wouldn'tliveinoneuntilIgetsooldIhavetobereallyclosetoamenities.

The City Planners: Change the curriculum. Look at what ishappening/hashappenedinEuropeandadaptsomeoftheirmethods.

The Planning: Doesn'thavecontext.

A Unified Transportation System: BetterREGIONALplanning.Toomanyturfwarsandfolkswithvestedinterests.

The Land: Ah,vivethe land!Keepasmany openspacesaspossible for agriculture, forests, places for folks to visit andenjoy, and keep the transportation systems away from themiddleofvalleys.

A Good Transportation System: Better REGIONAL planning.Toomany turf warsand folkswith vestedinterests.keep thetransportation systemsaway from themiddleof valleys. Planaheadoutto50years.

Very Expensive Houses: LOL.Soontobeacorrectioninex-pensivehomes.

The Growth: Well,ifSARS/birdfludoesn'tdecimatethepopu-lation wehaveto figure out waysofcontrolling it. Ofmixingpeopleand thelandandgettingthemwheretheyneed togoeasily.

One Large City: Nothing.Don't thinkanything can bedone.

Onceacityhasgrownitwouldtakean"ActofGod"toreducethesize.

A Mini-Mall: Mini-mallsaregood.Leavethemwheretheyarebutfigureoutwaysofgettingpeopleto themeasilyandusingpublictransportationorbywalking.

The Region: Bettertransportationplanning

My Home: Sellitnextyearandmovetothecountry.Ataprofit.

My House: WishIcouldmoveittothecountry.Justchangethelandandsite.

r.



Values: Estate ‘Space’

Estate Space, a triad of sustainability re-lationships

Telework: Changepublicopin-

ion.Teleworkshouldbeanop-tionforthosesuitedtoit.Newemployeesshouldrequestit,employersshouldbeencour-agedtopromoteitandofcourse,soshouldgovernment-evenmorethanitisdoingnow.Tele-workmaybeanissueiftheter-roristscontinuetokillfolksduringrushhour.Noonewantstobeblownupduringtheircommutetowork.

Equity Axis:

(Yourself, children, relatives, parents, neighbors, citizens of the city, citizens of the area, citi-zens of the Puget Sound region, citizens of Washington State, citizens of the United States ofAmerica, global population.) public opinion, telework, an option, new employees, employers, course, government, telework, an issue, the terrorists,folks, hour, their commute, telework, implications, other people, my brother, a nurse, work, my husband, home, mymom lives downtown, shops, my brother, a nurse, work, patients, most, my close neighbors, telecommute, offices, onephysician commutes, ghc downtown, a better quality, life, a healthier life, a better environment, less traffic, more people,a healthier life, less traffic, more people, a better environment, access, previously inaccessible towns, life, rural people ,those east, the mountains, the distances, a positive impact, western washington, a better quality, life, a healthier life, abetter environment, less traffic, rural people, an example, washington state, the rest, the country, a matter, time,changes, my lifetime, the internet, the usa, the world, resources, china, more gas and oil, the costs, fuel, home, the usa,the leader, energy reduction

Changepublicopinion.Teleworkshouldbeanoptionforthosesuitedtoit.Newemployeesshouldre- questit,employersshouldbeencouragedtopromoteitandofcourse,soshouldgovernment-evenmorethanitisdoingnow.Teleworkmaybeanissueiftheterroristscontinuetokillfolksduringrushhour.Noonewantstobeblownupduringtheircommutetowork....Well,Ialreadytelework.None.Butitmighthaveimplicationsforotherpeople…None.Mybrotherisanurseandmusttraveltowork.MyhusbandworksfromhomeasIdo.Mymomlivesdowntownclosetoshops.…Explanation:Mybrotherisanurseandmusttraveltowork.Hecan'tworkonpatientsfromhome.…Mostofmycloseneighborsalsotele- commuteorhaveofficesclosetowheretheylive.OnephysiciancommutestoGHCdowntownbuttakesaspecialshuttle.…Abetterqualityoflife.Ahealthierlife.Abetterenvironment.Lesstrafficwhentheydohavetodrive.Bettertransportationsystemsincemorepeoplewillbeusingitandsupportingit.…Abetterqualityoflife.Ahealthierlife.Abetterenvironment.Lesstrafficwhentheydohavetodrive.Bettertrans- portationsystemsincemorepeoplewillbeusingitandsupportingit.Easieraccesstopreviouslyinacces- sibletowns.Betterstandardoflifeforruralpeople.…ProbablywillnotaffectthoseeastofthemountainswherethedistancesaresolargebutwillhaveapositiveimpactonthoseinWesternWashington.Abetter

qualityoflife.Ahealthierlife.Abetterenvironment.Lesstrafficwhentheydohavetodrive.Bettertrans- portationsystemsincemorepeoplewillbeusingitandsupportingit.Easieraccesstopreviouslyinacces- sibletowns.Betterstandardoflifeforruralpeople.….Wow.WellifwesetanexampleinWashingtonStatemaybetherestofthecountrywilladaptit.Personally,Ithinkit'sjustamatteroftimebeforetherewillbechanges.Notinmylifetime,butlater.TheInternetisalreadymakingsomethingspossible-liketele- work.…TheUSAusestoomuchoftheworld'sresources.WithChinaandIndiademandingmoregasandoil,thecostsoffuelwillgosohighwe'llbereducedtoworkingfromhomeandonlytravelingwhenitisab- solutelynecessary.TheUSAoughttobeplanningforthateventualityandbeingtheleaderinenergyre- duction.



Environmental Axis:

Home, neighborhood, Seattle-Tacoma-Everett metropolitan area, Western slope of the Cas-cades (Vancouver B.C. to Portland) area, planetary biosphere

the foreseeable future, minimal impact, humans, some initial environmental damage, those kinks, the environment,cleaner air, water, humans, some initial environmental damage, those kinks, the environment, cleaner air, water

Nonefortheforeseeablefuture.….Doneproperlythereoughttobeminimalimpact.However,whenhave

weeverdoneanythingcorrectly(we,humans,thatis).Iexpecttherewillbesomeinitialenvironmentaldamageuntilwefigureoutwhatwearedoingbutthenwewillworkthosekinksoutandgenerallyspeakingtheenvironmentwillbecleaner:cleanerair,water,etc.…

Doneproperlythereoughttobeminimalimpact.…However,whenhaveweeverdoneanythingcorrectly(we,humans,thatis).….Iexpecttherewillbesomeinitialenvironmentaldamageuntilwefigureoutwhatwearedoingbutthenwewillworkthosekinksoutandgenerallyspeakingtheenvironmentwillbecleaner:cleanerair,water,etc.

Economic Axis:

(Yourself, neighborhood residents, Seattle-Tacoma-Everett metropolitan area residents, Stateof Washington economy, GNP of the United States, world economy)

,more green space, forests , wildlife, places, people, their neighborhoods, a regional basis, less expensive living, higher real estate prices, a better job market, more folks, home, less money, new roads, the infrastructure and transportation

options, initial increase, taxes, the future, folks, services / goods, more taxes, rich, considerable savings, employers, so-ciety, a better quality, life, folks, efficiently, the poor countries, the wealthy countries, literate societies, it, infrastructureand food

Cleanerair,moregreenspace,forests,wildlife,placesforpeopletogointheirneighborhoods.Betterliv- ing.…Probablybeexpensivebutlesssoifplannedonaregionalbasis.Betterliving,lessexpensiveliving,higherrealestateprices,abetterjobmarketsincemorefolkswillbeabletoworkfromhome.…Lessmoneyspentonbuildingnewroads;moreonmaintainingtheinfrastructureandtransportationoptions.Ini- tialincreaseintaxestopayforallthisbutinthefutureshouldbeless.Betterhealthsothatfolkscanworklongertoproduceservices/goods.Andpaymoretaxescausethey'restillworking.…We'llallberich!…Ithinkthereareconsiderablesavingsforemployersandsocietyandabetterqualityoflife.Alsomeansfolkscanlivewherevertheywantandstillbeabletoworkefficiently.…LikelymakethepoorcountriesevenpoorerandthewealthycountriesevenmorewealthyunlesswecancreateliteratesocietieswithagoodITinfrastructureandfood.

supporting online elicitation for deliberation of public transportation concerns

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