Metro21: Smart Cities Institute › Projects › Economic Prosperity

Economic Prosperity

As the pace of technological change continues to accelerate, Metro21 works with its deployment partners to ensure that new technologies are used to advance economic prosperity. Metro21 addresses how ride-sharing options can be used to effectively improve economic mobility in rural areas, and how smart phone applications can link prospective workers with businesses trying to find employees.

Active Projects

ARISE Planning Grant "POWER"

This planning grant will help us better understand the mobility challenges of the selected Appalachian communities in OH, PA and WV and better inform implementation projects to address these issues and improve the economic mobility of the region and its people.

Leveraging Existing Fiber-Optic Cables to Identify and Manage Urban Environmental Hazards

The pilot project, which builds on preliminary research in Pittsburgh, will target just one area of the city to test the approach. DAS will be calibrated with temporary conventional sensors and input from civic partners. Researchers said the challenges Pittsburgh offers could show proof of concept that the science would work in other areas.

Deploying Charging Infrastructure to Catalyze Market Adoption of Electric Vehicles

The team proposes to develop advanced simulation and optimization tools at the intersection of grid and transportation systems to help state and local agencies and utilities better understand how public electric vehicle supply equipment (EVSE) deployment (i.e., number and placement of EVSE affects EVSE access and electric vehicle (EV) adoption and in turn grid reliability, travel time and cost, mobility energy productivity, distributional equity, air quality, and health across communities.

Equitable Broadband

With the announcement of the recent Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) Program funding, Metro21 is taking an active role in ensuring that residents across Pennsylvania have access to affordable, high-speed internet.

Empowering and Enhancing Workers Through Building A Community-Centered Gig Economy

The gig economy is characterized by short-term contract work performed by independent workers who are paid in return for the "gigs" they complete. Example gig platforms include Uber, Lyft, Instacart, Upwork, and TaskRabbit. While these platforms bring about more job opportunities and lower barriers to entry, growing evidence suggests its generation of significant societal problems, including reduced worker well-being, and perpetuated biases against already vulnerable populations. Most gig workers lack financial stability, autonomy, and have low earning efficiency. Prolonged working hours can also cause health issues and limited flexibility.

Guaranteed Basic Mobility

Transportation mobility is the single largest factor in a household achieving economic mobility. In other words, households that have a high degree of reliable, efficient transportation that they can afford and use have a higher probability of moving up the economic ladder. Transportation access, however, is not universally available and is certainly inequitable.

Smart and Equitable Parks

This project is obtaining, processing, and analyzing several types of data including: 1) GIS map data for understanding community network topologies and transportation properties; 2) traffic use data (for both public transportation and walkable/bikeable pathways) measured using Urbano nodes (configured with passive infrared sensors), as well as traffic data, under different circumstances; 3) environmental data measured using Urbano nodes (configured with NO2, SO2, O3, PM2.5, and noise intensity sensors) at parks to inform nodal weights within the network.

World Economic Forum Trustworthy IoT Coalition

The Trustworthy IoT Coalition is a flagship project of the Future of the Connected World initiative, aiming to improve the trustworthiness of consumer Internet of Things devices, such as voice assistants, security cameras, and smart watches. Ultimately it will help to create an IoT system that is more robust, equitable, trustworthy and sustainable for consumers, and empower individuals to make informed decisions regarding adoption and use of these technologies.

Completed Projects

Enabling and Sustaining Connected Communities Rooted in Solving Societal Challenges

With funding from the National Science Foundation, Metro21: Smart Cities Institute hosted an in-person workshop and a series of pre-workshop virtual listening sessions designed to elicit feedback and suggestions from experts in academia, government, nonprofits, civic organizations, and industry to identify solutions to the significant technical, policy, and socioeconomic challenges to integration and scaling of connected communities technologies.

City of Bridges: Using New Transportation Options to Drive Low-Income Mothers to Greater Success in Pittsburgh

Funded by the National Science Foundation and led by an interdisciplinary team including Metro21, this project will create new methods for modeling these regional transportation systems. The new models will reflect the growing interaction between conventional mass transit and a range of complementary new (and old) transit technologies. The knowledge gained from these models could further expand mass transit ridership and resident mobility, while also promoting environmental sustainability.

Developing and Deploying Methodologies for Improving the Accuracy, Fairness, and Trustworthiness of Risk Assessment Models in Child Welfare

This proposal aims to contribute toward developing and deploying methodologies for improving the accuracy, fairness, and trustworthiness of risk assessment models in child welfare.

Providing Enhanced Public Input on Metro21 Projects

Carnegie Mellon's Program for Deliberative Democracy will now extend its efforts by working with Metro21 to design and implement a public engagement component for their work.

Latham Street Commons and the Night Owl Bakers Program

The Night Owl Bakers is an educational workforce development program that provides a holistic approach to self-identity and employment preparedness for young adults. The program innovatively combines 21st century skills through making and selling artisanal breads and baked goods. Our proposed project will provide evidence for the effectiveness of a holistic educational program for self-identity, mental health, and employment preparedness for young adults who are transitioning out of foster-care and those often left in the margins of new educational/workforce training opportunities.

On-demand Work Recommendation for Disadvantaged Youth Using Smartphones

We propose On-demand work matching for at-risk young adults, a novel initiative for workforce development and employment through mobile and recommendation technology combined with a nine-month training program called Night Owl Bakers (NOB) developed by the Latham Street Commons.

Open Pittsburgh wireless Research Accelerator (OPERA)

The Open Pittsburgh wireless Research Accelerator (OPERA) is an initiative led by CMU’s Metro21 Smart Cities Institute in partnership with the City of Pittsburgh and other public and private entities.

Putting Data to Work

Supporting Workforce Development through Data-Driven Skill Retraining and Job Recommendations.

Future of Work: Can Ridehailing Help the Disadvantaged get Work?

Led by Dr. Lee Branstetter, the goal of this research project is to examine the potential effects of ridehailing services on the mobility of Pittsburgh's least advantaged citizens.

AWARD WINNING PROJECT - Utilizing School Bus Routes to Deliver Meals to Families in Need

In collaboration with Metro21: Smart Cities Institute, researchers in Carnegie Mellon’s Robotics Institute used artificial intelligence to create optimal, efficient bus routes that allow community non-profit organizations to deliver meals to senior citizens, as well as K-12 students and families who would otherwise rely on schools for free meals. The CMU tools identified ideal distribution locations in order to reach as many people as possible, three days a week. Collaborating with our numerous community-based partners, nearly 6,000 meals are delivered each month. The program started in July, 2020, is expanding from one municipality to several more (we launched McKeesport School District in October and will expand to McKees Rocks School District in November and is expected to continue through the end of the year (and likely longer as the pandemic continues into 2021).

Smart Services for People Experiencing Homelessness

This project combats homelessness by allowing agencies that offer street outreach services the opportunity to collaborate via a phone app.

Urban Quality of Life Indicators

Sustainability and Quality of Life are commonly used terms and many data-based indicators, indexes, and assessment tools have been developed to measure their success, yet their usefulness for city planning policy and decision-making has been debated over the years. A question regarding quality of life indicators was posed by Metro21: how can research proposals be evaluated at an early stage to determine whether proposed research will lead to improved quality of life, and to what degree?

Explore. Connect. Partner

Explore Our Resources

Partner with Us