Federation of Small Businesses runs social media campaign to highlight impact of parking on London's high street
The Federation of Small Businesses (FSB) has today announced a new tool it hopes will tackle what it describes as a ?burning political issue? of parking in London.
The
Parking Crowdmap aims to demonstrate how parking availability, or lack thereof, affects small businesses. The Parking Crowdmap is part of FSB?s ?Keep Trade Local? social media campaign to keep the public shopping on the high streets. FSB is calling for businesses right across London?s 33 boroughs to share reports, photos and their opinions - the good, the bad and the ugly ? of parking issues and policies that impact positively and negatively on their business.
Steve Warwick, London Regional Chairman at FSB comments, ?Parking continues to be one of the major policy concerns for our London members which I why we have devised a Parking Crowdmap that we are getting businesses to populate. This will give the FSB greater power to persuade councils to think small first with their parking policies and ensure that more customers shop locally and are not forced to going to out of town supermarkets.?
Businesses can submit their parking report by going directly to the Crowdmap website, via the Crowdmap app on iPhone or Android or head to Twitter and use hashtag
#LondonParking for inclusion.
Matthew Jaffa, London sSenior dDevelopment mManager at FSB explains, ?this is not a naming and shaming exercise but a chance for London councils to see firsthand about how their parking policies are impacting on businesses (who are also voters in local elections and not just residents!!!) - they can also share best practice. We hope that with a greater following and appeal businesses will start to input issues on mass and this will create pockets of interest and we will be able to build a picture of parking ?hotspots?.? The campaign was picked up by BBC Radio and BBC Breakfast this morning.
Crowdmap is a tool that allows organisations to crowdsource information and see it on a map and timeline. It was created by
Ushahidi, a non-profit technology company that created a crowdsourcing platform by the same name to capture crisis information that could be sent to mobile devices.
Other companies that have run crowdsourcing campaigns that have been run on Crowdmap include British Geological Society and Hackney Citizen Advice Bureau.
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