Squeaky wheels: Missing data, disability, and power in the smart city

Abstract

Data about the accessibility of United States municipalities is infrastructure in the smart city. What is counted and how, reflects the sociotechnical imaginary (norms and values) of a time or place. In this paper we focus on features identified by people with disabilities as promoting or hindering safe pedestrian travel. We use a regionally stratified sample of 178 cities across the United States. The municipalities were scored on two factors: their open data practices (or lack thereof), and the degree to which they cataloged the environmental features that persons with disabilities deemed critical for safe movement through urban spaces. In contradiction to the dominating narrative of too much data and not enough analyses, we find that when it comes to data points that might be useful to persons with disabilities, data are lacking. This data gap has consequences both politically and materially—on one hand data could help enforce compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act, on the other they would allow for safe route planning. We find that reading these data formats and collection patterns from the perspective of critical disability studies—particularly those whose work disrupts notions of “normal” —helps answer questions about potential benefits and harms of data practices. This lens has the potential to promote analysis that is as disruptive to injustices as it is practical.