BIG DATA AND RECOMPOSITION OF URBAN GOVERNANCE IN THE DIGITAL ERATHE CASE OF THE WAZE APP

Antoine CourmontAssociate Researcher, CEE, Sciences Po

Scientific Director of the Sciences Po’s Cities and Digital Technology Chair

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A NEW FORM OF QUANTIFICATION : BIG DATAData and public policies• Data is a classic tool of government at national or local level (statistics, accounting,

cartography, etc.)

Big data as large amount of massive, exhaustive, various and real-time data• A change of level: a huge volume of data • A change in the nature: a new kind of data (digital traces) that record all urban activities

Jointly with this new form of quantification, new actors have appeared• Digital platforms’ activity is based on their capacity of collecting, analyzing and using

these digital traces.

To what extent this new form of quantification (and these new intermediaries) disrupts local public policies?

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What are the effects of platform and big data on urbangovernance?

Two hypotheses: 1) big data offers new representations of the city that disrupt public

institutions’ stable organization of reality, enabling new actors—platforms—to put forward alternative ways of regulating urban space and thereby generating tensions with local public authorities;

2) 2) however, the modes used to produce these new data bring to light ways of accommodating both the reality established by public institutions and reality according to digital service platforms.

THE CASE OF THE WAZE APP

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THE CASE OF THE WAZE APPWaze• An Israeli start-up founded in 2008• A routing app based on user’s data collected in

real-time• Acquired in 2013 by Google (US$966 million)• Business model: location-based advertising• 2017: 200+ countries• Number of users: 120+ millions in 2018, 12+

million in France• 500-1000 employees

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SIMULTANEOUS ACTIVE USERS (MARCH 2018)Country City NumberUS New York, NY 128866BR Sao Paulo 119025FR Paris 108485US Los Angeles, CA 98912US Washington, DC 72384MX CDMX 67162MY Petaling Jaya 52807US Boston, MA 49110US Atlanta, GA 46729US San Francisco, CA 42875IL Tel Aviv 36195UK London 35916PH Manila 34682US Miami, FL 33191CL Santiago 31643PE Lima 30109US Chicago, IL 29365US Philadelphia, PA 29199US Dallas, TX 28262

Unoficial Waze Stats

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SIMULTANEOUS ACTIVE USERS (MARCH 2018)Country City NumberFR Paris 108485UK London 35916RO Bucharest 18508FR Bordeaux 16808BE Brussels 12656FR Lyon 11123FR Nantes 10919ES Madrid 10860IT Milano 9043FR Lille 8962CZ Praha 8189HU Budapest 7589LV Riga 6642IT Rome 6559BE Antwerp 5977NL Amsterdam 5856PT Lisbon 5746UA Kiev 3708SK Bratislava 3306

Unoficial Waze Stats

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SIMULTANEOUS ACTIVE USERS - PARIS (3-17 MARCH 2018)

Unoficial Waze Stats

1. REGULATE THE NETWORK OR THE DRIVERS?

THE DOUBLE REALITY OF ROAD CIRCULATION

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FROM DATA ATTACHED TO INFRASTUCTURE…

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FROM DATA ATTACHED TO INFRASTUCTURE…

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TO DATA ATTACHED TO DRIVERSWaze data are untied from road network• Collect users’ GPS location to monitor driving speed

for each road segment.

Three main characteristics of Waze data:• Crowdsourcing: independence and control of the

production of data • Completeness: data for all roads • Precise knowledge of driving speed

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TWO DIFFERENT PERCEPTIONS OF TRAFFIC CONGESTION

Congestion = a saturation of the network which constrain the fluidity of traffic• Data measure flow of vehicles (flow and occupancy rates)• Regulate the traffic to maintain a smooth flow of vehicles (information, change the

green time, reduce the speed of circulation)• Aims: concentrate Traffic on main roads

“Save every driver 5 minutes per day, every day”• Congestion : a deterioration of drivers’ travel time • A new frame: a temporal perspective (time wasting) rather than a spatial one

(saturation of the network)• Data measure speed and travel time • Regulate the individual behavior through routing algorithm (drivers follow the GPS)• Reducing congestion by distributing traffic on all public streets (all roads are equal)

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REGULATE NETWORKS OR DRIVERS?

Actor Think Act Represent

Road network

Authority

Make Traffic Flow

smoother

(spatial perspective)

On the flow

(Traffic Lights +

Information)

Occupancy rates

Waze

Minimize travel time

(temporal

perspective)

On individual Drivers

(Routing algorithms)

Real-time Driving

speed on all road

segments

=> Network versus « post-network » regulation

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WAZE: ALLY OF PUBLIC REGULATION?

« Waze solves some problems for us. By automatically redirecting drivers, it keeps traffic away from the most crowded areas. ».

Manager, Traffic Control Center, Lyon (2017)

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WAZE: COMPETITOR OF PUBLIC REGULATION?

People follow their GPS, no matter what we indicate in traffic signs. Our means of action don’t work anymore.

Manager, Traffic Control Center, Lyon (2017)

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DIVERTED TRAFFIC INTO RESIDENTIAL AREAS

Cody Road, Sherman Oaks (Los Angeles)- 900 cars / hour on a

road built for 2000 cars / day

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CONFLICTS BETWEEN WAZE AND PUBLIC INSTITUTIONS

They have an individualist view of mobility that is in conflict with public policies which aims to concentrate the flow of cars on main roads. They are in contradiction with public authorities.

Responsable Mobilité, Lyon, mai 2017

That’s more a symptom than a cause. We need to start looking at the bigger picture. Why the congestion? why is that happening ? Probably because the infrastructure isn’t in the right place, because the urban planning wasn’t planned for 50 millions people living in the city it was planned for 20. Urban planning is outdated. Infrastructures are not well-conceived to answer the needs of people living in the suburbs.

Waze, Head of Partnerships, juillet 2017

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THE « DELIQUESCENCE » (DIDIER) OF PUBLIC DATAThe public reality of road congestion is challenged• Another frame of the issue: flow versus time travel• Another perimeter: Waze doesn’t care about institutional territories, it unifies

the reality beyond local borders (which was the prerogative of the State)

Disruption of public authorities• The power of public institution to coordinate people through a common

representation of reality is challenged. • By losing their capacity to prove, public institutions are weakened in their

power of governing.

2. ACT ON DATA TO COPRODUCE TRAFFIC REGULATION

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WAZE: THREE TYPES OF CROWDSOURCED DATA

The travel traces : driving speed

User’s report: events (traffic, police, accidents,

road closures, etc.)

Contributions: a community of volunteer map editors

CHANGE THE ROAD INFRASTRUCTURE

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ACT ON ROAD INFRASTRUCTURE

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GAMING THE ALGORITHM

Adapt the road infrastructure to reduce driving speed• Reducing the maximum speed, building speed bumps, increasing traffic

light time, changing the local traffic plan, etc.

=> Retroaction between the algorithm, the road infrastructure and Wazedata

THE DATA EXCHANGE PARTNERSHIPS

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DATA EXCHANGE PARTNERSHIPSWaze Connected Citizens Program• 600 partners in 50 countries‒ 50% of Us Dept of Transportation

• 10 French local public authorities

A win-win partnership:• Waze: consolidate the road closure data • Public authorities: ‒ A complementary tool to deal with major events

(public works, etc.) ‒ A way to keep the control on information given

to drivers (through an other media)

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REDEPLOYMENT OF PUBLIC POLICIES THROUGH DATA« As a public authority, our added value, our major role is the production of data.»

(Road Manager, Département du Var, avril 2017).

A new division of tasks between public and private actors• Public actors: production and provision of quality data• Private actors: development of digital services based on

these data

An indirect government through the provision of public data: strengthen the semantic power of public institutions

CONCLUSION

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CONCLUSIONBig data challenge the semantic power of public institutions to say what it is • People coordinate with each other from other representations of the reality. • However, public institutions do have a capacity to influence the production of

these alternative realities.

The benefits of a political sociology of urban data • Data reveals new relationships between public and private actors in local public

policies• Rather than oppose this two way of regulate traffic, it is necessary to analyze

the interactions between public authorities, Waze and its community of editors• A co-production of traffic regulation through data?

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BIBLIOGRAPHYCourmont Antoine et Patrick Le Galès (eds.), Gouverner la ville numérique, Paris, PUF, 2019

Courmont Antoine, « Plateforme, big data et recomposition du gouvernement urbain. Les effets de Waze sur les politiques de régulation du trafic », Revue française de sociologie, 2018/3 (Vol. 59), p. 423-449. https://www.cairn.info/revue-francaise-de-sociologie-2018-3-page-423.htm• an English translation of this paper will soon be

published on the journal's website

ANTOINE COURMONTantoine.courmont@sciencespo.fr@AnCourmont