Looking into the future, by KaroliK

Some of our Metronauts contributors came together at the invitation of our friends at TRAC this past Saturday to discuss the future of Metronauts.ca.  Since our site activity dropped off in December, many have been asking the question – “What’s going on with Metronauts?”.  This post is a summary of how we got here and an invitation to our community to guide our future direction.

This site was originally conceived as a community space to discuss issues and plans contained within the Metrolinx Regional Transportation Plan alongside its public consultation process.  With Metrolinx as a major sponsor, my role was to help create the platforms for community engagement, including this site, and to help steward the community. With that project completed (and with my role as a consultant to Metrolinx now done) it is time to reflect on what this place is, who we are as a community and what we might do together in the future.

I will retain my role as steward of the Metronauts brand and the metronauts.ca web domain, but I am looking for proposals and leadership from our community about what the future of the site could be. I intend to step into a supporting role for the best vision and plan for the future.

The role of Editor-in-Chief is now open. We are looking for proposals from the right person with the vision, energy, leadership and ability to help us realize the potential of this site.

There are several key assets and strengths we can build from:

• metronauts.ca domain and the playful and engaging Metronauts brand
• a beautiful visual identity and strong design direction from Alistair Morton of Peapod Studios
• a strong core of content with some talented and passionate contributors
• an informed and active community of commenters who engage in intelligent discourse about the issues they care about
• a strong readership: 16,675 absolute unique visitors, 69,691 pageviews and 1,324 comments since August 1st, 2008 (the Google Analytics graph below charts weekly site visits over this period)

We need your feedback. Please leave a comment and answer some key questions:

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For those of you wanting to stretch your creative boundaries for transit ideas geographically, the Chicago Chamber of Commerce has put out a request on the Innocentive website for ideas on: Ideas for Increasing Public Transportation to Reduce Greenhouse Gases in Chicago.

Checkout: http://www.innocentive.com/

Its not a traditional RFP, they just want your ideas, and there is no cost for submission, other than your time.

Did I mention there is a $5,000 prize for the best idea ?

I am sure many of the ideas generated through TransitCamps and Metronauts are as applicable in Chicago as they are in Toronto.

If anyone wants to collaborate on a submission, contact me at

Metrolinx is conducting a series of public meetings around the region from October 20th through 30th. For more details and to register:

http://www.metrolinx.com/en/event.aspx

We encourage people to sign-up and learn the details of the plans for the future of Toronto region’s transportation infrastructure.

The Metrolinx Board will be meeting October 24th and November 28th, which is expected to be focused on the approval of the RTP.

What about the Metronauts community?

We’ve been eager to do another big unconference event for a while now, and I know many have been asking about it, but we haven’t been able to schedule one with Metrolinx’ support and involvement. I still hope we’ll be able to hold another major event soon.

Into the void, the indomitable Ed Drass has stepped up and got a weekly series of community meetings setup at Metro Hall in the coming weeks. We’ll be bringing a bit of that unconference magic to these, so we hope you can join us.

METRO HALL MEETINGS
55 John St. @ King St.
Room 303
Toronto

Tue., Oct. 14  5:45 pm  “What do you want to know about the Regional Transportation Plan?”
Tue., Oct. 21  7:00 pm   Topic TBA
Tue., Oct. 28  7:00 pm   Topic TBA

To be updated on these meetings, please send an email to Ed at

Join us for the conversation. We can use the TransitCamp.org Wiki to take notes from these sessions, so we’re looking for participants who can lead the conversation, ask good questions and capture the content of the sessions for sharing with the rest of the community. Volunteers with video cameras wanted!

Photo Source: Rannie Turingan

It has been just over a week since the relaunch of this site, and we’ve seen some fantastic growth in readership (over 3,600 visits) and comments (253 and counting) with new contributors volunteering. As the online community grows, we want to make sure it is a healthy community.

This post has a few principles and tips for how to add value to the conversation. It boils down to this:

• Be real
• Respect each other
• Find solutions for the future

Read more after the jump.

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