On Monday evening, Mass. Governor Deval Patrick announced that the Bay State's public transportation system will run into the wee hours of morn in 2014. Starting in the spring, Boston's MBTA system will continue to chug past its midnight bedtime till 3 a.m. – a change for which many folks within the city's startup community seem excited.
The extension of the MBTA's hours is an example of a change well-aligned with the needs of Boston's innovation ecosystem. And, with next week's hackathon, the members of said ecosystem will have the opportunity to show their gratitude by paying the favor right back.
hack/reduce, Massachusetts Department of Transportation, Massachusetts Big Data and the Massachusetts Tech Collaborative will host a free-to-register event dubbed MassDOT Visualizing Transportation Hackathon on December 13th to help generate ideas for improving public transit from the next generation's entrepreneurs.
Using an extensive collection of state transportation data, attendees will collaborate to analyze the current information and brainstorm hacks with a specific focus on travel behavior and road-rail comparisons, as well as the energy, environmental and social impacts of transportation mode-choice.
The event will be held at hack/reduce, starting on Friday at 6 p.m. and lasting till 11 p.m. The next morning at 9 a.m. the big data shop will open its doors once more to hackers, who will work until presentations and prizes are allotted around 9 p.m.
Leveraging the talent pool in Boston to solve the city's public needs could very well usher in a new age of cooperation between City Hall and the startup community. The more the two parties work together, the more clearly and easily, I imagine, small businesses' voices will be heard in local and state governments, thereby allowing Boston to organically evolve into an ultimate destination – not just on the East Coast, but in the world – for bright-eyed founders to flock.
The extended T hours, then, are a strong step in the right direction. Cambridge Innovation Center's Tim Rowe echoed that with such shifts in the public transit system, city government has the potential to push the "play" aspect of Boston's young entrepreneurial scene to a new level:
Here in Boston, we have tended to think of the T's early closure as a kind of act of god. You live with it. But what we miss is that we're in a global competition for talent. Young people around the world very much are evaluating cities to live in based upon the cultural and fun factor. The other night I was in Shoreditch, the startup area in London, and at 3:25 in the morning there was a line out the door of the local Doner Kebab place. The streets were absolutely hopping. It was clear to me that London is a city for young people. One of Amsterdam's big industries, believe it or not, is the electronic dance music scene. And it is a very hot place for young, creative people. If we want to stay competitive, Boston has to capitalize on the incredible youth we have here due to our strong colleges and universities, and maintain our place as a cultural and life capital of the world that is attractive to young creatives.
