London Windows Phone app helps keep the streets clean

By Daniel Rubino
last updated

Here's a pretty ingenious way for citizens to use the power of mobile phones, specifically the camera, GPS and internet, to take back their streets.

Giving a quick way for citizens to report vandalism, garbage and other such nuisances, people simply take a photo and upload it to a public message board where the appropriate authorities can then act on it. It's a smart way to get government to be more efficient and for citizens to take part in maintaining the community. As a result, the town has reduced graffiti by 73% and response time has gone from 2 1/2 days to just a 1/2 day--pretty impressive.

Goes to show how technology can really make an impact in people's quality of life. Too bad we can't envision U.S. politicians being so progressive about technology and implementing such a program. Head to the BBC site to see the video of it in action, pretty cool stuff.

Source: BBC; Thanks, Neil

Daniel Rubino
Daniel Rubino
Editor-in-chief

Daniel Rubino is the Editor-in-chief of Windows Central, head reviewer, podcast co-host, and analyst. He has been covering Microsoft since 2007 when this site was called WMExperts (and later Windows Phone Central). His interests include Windows, laptops, next-gen computing, and for some reason, watches. Before all this tech stuff, he worked on a Ph.D. in linguistics, watched people sleep (for medical purposes!), and ran the projectors at movie theaters because it was fun.