Hariri Institute Researchers Use Big Data to Find Safer Urban Paths
Boston University and University of Pittsburg researchers are utilizing Big Data to find urban walking paths that factor in both distance and safety. Esther Galbrun, a postdoc at BU working with Hariri Faculty Fellow Evimaria Terzi of the Computer Science Department, presented a paper titled “Safe Navigation in Urban Environments” at the 3rd International Workshop on Urban Computing in conjunction with KDD2014. She described a set of algorithms that analyzes the shortest path, the safest path, and alternatives in between to provide options for a person walking through a city while addressing concerns that people face everyday. As cities release more data and researchers like Galbrun find new ways to analyze it, people living in cities can potentially enjoy an improved quality of life.