Because transit is a multifaceted social good, we considered stakeholders from multiple sectors. Our transit organization and policy stakeholders include Sound Transit, King County Metro, the Federal Transit Administration, the ORCA joint board, and other local transit agencies. Our transit advocacy stakeholder groups include the Transit Riders Union, Disability Rights Washington, El Centro de la Raza, the Amalgamated Transit Union, King County Social Services, and Commute Seattle. Additionally, businesses are stakeholders from the perspective of organizations who purchase bulk ORCA cards for employees through the business passport program and as locations serviced by transit. Finally, stakeholders internal to our internship program include the University of Washington eScience Institute, Data Science for Social Good Fellows and project leads present and future, and the Washington State Transportation Center (TRAC).
To incorporate stakeholder feedback into our project, we met with representatives from the Transit Riders Union, Disability Rights Washington, and King County Metro who are familiar with ORCA fare card data. We took into consideration their suggestions for project direction and concerns surrounding transit accessibility and improvement in the Puget Sound region. We ensured that the types of analysis we completed would be useful for their organizations and that there were not unintentional pitfalls that could negatively affect the demographics that their organizations advocate for.
The primary use case for our project is internally by TRAC and ORCA employees to produce further insights and improvements surrounding the ORCA database. Additionally, future Data Science for Social Good fellows at University of Washington will be able to build upon our work for years to come.