Taking lessons from other societally critical sectors
Standing on the shoulders of giants
We take our inspiration from the UK's BioBank - since 2006 this large-scale biomedical database and research resource containing in-depth genetic and health information from over 500,000 UK volunteers aged between 40 and 69 years old has been helping accelerate medical research. As a resource it has become a major contributor to the advancement of modern medicine and treatment and has enabled several scientific discoveries that improve human health.
Collecting an unprecedented amount of biological and medical data with full user consent including regularl blood, urine and saliva samples. As well as detailed information about their lifestyles which are then linked to their health-related records to provide a deeper understanding of how individuals experience diseases. It is globally accessible to approved researchers and scientists undertaking vital research into the most common and life-threatening diseases.
The data – the largest and richest dataset of its kind – is anonymised and made widely accessible by UK Biobank to researchers around the world who use it to make new scientific discoveries about common and life-threatening diseases – such as cancer, heart disease and stroke – in order to improve public health.
The continued involvement of the volunteers also makes this one of the foremost time series studies, able to capture the "seasons of life" as participants enter their later years and grow old with the programme.
Leading by example TravelAi has worked with Global Leaders in Privacy Advocacy
Supported by international privacy advocates the Omidyar Network, Benchmark Initiative’s Entrepreneur-in-Residence programme, Ethical Geo and Geovation, who TravelAi worked with to develop and launch an Open Source anonymization tool for trajectory data. This was to enable the wider use of the high resolution spatio-temporal data that TravelAi's IP generates, so it can serve a wider set of goals and transport stakeholders - with the ultimate aim towards better functioning transport systems for drivers, passengers, pedestrians and cyclists.
The solution and process were then open sourced and released here on Github for a wider audience to discover to work and because the team believe in the importance of transparency and the power of data to solve critical sector challenges. Why not help start building the transport systems of the future today.
Our Benchmark and Omidyar Network supported output:
We outlined the work in a three-part series which was published on the Benchmark Trust website:
This is part of a wider body of work to build a transport data commons that due to its multimodal, potentially continuous time-series and spatio-temporal nature can be utilised by transport planners, service providers and infrastructure owners alike. Instead of multiple transport stakeholders commissioning multiple transport surveys, sometimes overlapping, almost always costly and then sourcing from digital and data silos.
The MyWays app is then an ideal companion service to be running for collecting longer time series data due to the effortless data capture. Running side-by-side with the same sample groups for example volunteer into the National Travel Demand Survey or the Census surveys.
We take our inspiration from the UK's BioBank - since 2006 this large-scale biomedical database and research resource containing in-depth genetic and health information from over 500,000 UK volunteers aged between 40 and 69 years old has been helping accelerate medical research. As a resource it has become a major contributor to the advancement of modern medicine and treatment and has enabled several scientific discoveries that improve human health.
Collecting an unprecedented amount of biological and medical data with full user consent including regularl blood, urine and saliva samples. As well as detailed information about their lifestyles which are then linked to their health-related records to provide a deeper understanding of how individuals experience diseases. It is globally accessible to approved researchers and scientists undertaking vital research into the most common and life-threatening diseases.
The data – the largest and richest dataset of its kind – is anonymised and made widely accessible by UK Biobank to researchers around the world who use it to make new scientific discoveries about common and life-threatening diseases – such as cancer, heart disease and stroke – in order to improve public health.
The continued involvement of the volunteers also makes this one of the foremost time series studies, able to capture the "seasons of life" as participants enter their later years and grow old with the programme.
Leading by example TravelAi has worked with Global Leaders in Privacy Advocacy
Supported by international privacy advocates the Omidyar Network, Benchmark Initiative’s Entrepreneur-in-Residence programme, Ethical Geo and Geovation, who TravelAi worked with to develop and launch an Open Source anonymization tool for trajectory data. This was to enable the wider use of the high resolution spatio-temporal data that TravelAi's IP generates, so it can serve a wider set of goals and transport stakeholders - with the ultimate aim towards better functioning transport systems for drivers, passengers, pedestrians and cyclists.
The solution and process were then open sourced and released here on Github for a wider audience to discover to work and because the team believe in the importance of transparency and the power of data to solve critical sector challenges. Why not help start building the transport systems of the future today.
Our Benchmark and Omidyar Network supported output:
We outlined the work in a three-part series which was published on the Benchmark Trust website:
- Part 1 – The knowledge paradox in transport
- Part 2 – Importance of place, time and duration
- Part 3 – It’s not just about the destination, it’s about the journey too
This is part of a wider body of work to build a transport data commons that due to its multimodal, potentially continuous time-series and spatio-temporal nature can be utilised by transport planners, service providers and infrastructure owners alike. Instead of multiple transport stakeholders commissioning multiple transport surveys, sometimes overlapping, almost always costly and then sourcing from digital and data silos.
The MyWays app is then an ideal companion service to be running for collecting longer time series data due to the effortless data capture. Running side-by-side with the same sample groups for example volunteer into the National Travel Demand Survey or the Census surveys.
